


Home

by dearygirl



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 23:09:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/932172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dearygirl/pseuds/dearygirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Graduation 2013, complete with flashbacks to the past four years. Written pre-Season 2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The "Present Day" story in 2013 alternates with sections of Flashbacks. Flashbacks are denoted with date stamps.

_  
Part I:_

_man oh man, you’re my best friend_  
  
~*~*~*~

   __  
  


He flips the Blue Book closed and slams his pencil down on top.

  
“Done.”

  
The remaining students in the classroom all look up in irritation.

  
“We’re ecstatic for you Mr. Winger. But please keep your excitement to yourself.”

  
Jeff unfolds himself from the desk (those damn, miniature desks that he will never have to sit at again - from here on out it’s only mahogany or oak, and one of those plush spinning chairs with a built in massager), hands in his exam and walks out of the classroom with his arms extended.

  
“I am officially done with college.”

  
His words are met with a chorus of cheers and an enthusiastic six-way group hug as his friends surround him. Jeff can’t help but laugh and pat someone, Abed maybe, on the head.

  
“Guys. I can’t breathe.”

  
“Oh we’re just so excited.” Shirley clasps her hands in front of her as they pull away. “We’re really done.”

  
“It’s a little sad though, right?”

  
“No.” Jeff points his finger at Britta’s face. “I will not be brought down by your need to inject gloom into every situation. I am enjoying this moment.”

  
She rolls her eyes.

  
“For once, I’m with Britta. This is pretty depressing.”

  
Shirley nods in agreement as Abed puts his arm around Troy in consolation.

  
Jeff sighs, “Guys, we’re going to see each other tomorrow. In fact, we’re going to be spending three hours in the same car together tomorrow. So why don’t we wait till then to talk about whether or not we’re going to miss each other.” No one laughs so he glares over at Britta and she throws her hands in the air.

  
“I know! I’m sorry. I killed the buzz. Again.”

  
“Don’t worry Britta, this type of feeling is common in finales. Besides, something will happen by the end to make Jeff have a sudden epiphany about how much all this has actually meant to him.”

  
“The end of what Abed?”

  
He tilts his head in thought, “I’m not completely sure. Normally  _this_  would be the final scene. But Jeff’s right. We’re going to see each other tomorrow. We’re breaking the standard finale formula.” His brow furrows as it is oft does when life does not live up to the television tropes on which he’s based all his theories.

  
“Well, at least we’ll get to see Annie tomorrow.”

  
Troy scowls, “It’s not really fair that she gets a whole ceremony and we get nothing.”

  
“That  _would_ have helped the finale vibe,” Abed murmurs to himself, thinking.

  
“Too bad the entire graduation budget had to be directed toward flood relief.”

  
Jeff speaks these words pointedly and everyone suddenly looks downcast with guilt. (They are the only six people who know the truth about what happened the night of, what has been dubbed, The Cafeteria Flood of 2013.)

  
“How was I supposed to know that pipe was so big?” Britta hisses through her teeth.

  
“That’s what she said!” Pierce crows. Everyone stares at him and he laughs, “You guys still don’t get the joke?”

  
Troy rolls his eyes, “No Pierce we get the joke. We got the joke ten years ago when it was an actual cool thing to say.”

  
Pierce leans over to Britta, “Was it too racist?”

  
Ever since an unfortunate incident involving a foreign exchange student, mistaken identity and an ill-worded text message, Pierce has been trying harder to make his comments more PC and Britta (lucky her) gets to be his constant point of reference.

  
She rolls her eyes, “There’s nothing racist about that joke Pierce.”

  
“Are you sure? Cause it’s about sex and black men are known for having large-”

  
“Pierce!”

  
Unfortunately, even with Britta’s help, Pierce  _still_  doesn’t understand what exactly constitutes racism or political correctness

  
Abed snaps his fingers suddenly. “We could put on our own graduation ceremony.”

  
Jeff is about to scoff at this but Troy’s eyes light up and Shirley says, “Oh that would be nice” and even Britta’s smiling - so there’s really nothing to do except purse his lips and nod his assent.

  
“Heeeeyyyy gang!” The Dean bounds around the corner and stops next to Jeff, “Did you all hear the good news?”

  
“You figured out why the water in the women’s restroom has been running brown for the past three weeks?” Britta asks.

  
“Ah. No.” The Dean pauses, looks caught for a moment, “But I can assure you, that will be taken care of immediately.”

  
“Uh-huh.”

  
“No. I’m sure he’s been too humble to announce it himself but Mr. Winger here has just accepted a position in the Political Science department of our prestigious institution!”

  
Everyone stares at Jeff in various degrees of shock.

  
Jeff clenches his jaw.

  
He really shouldn’t be surprised. The Dean’s been trying for weeks now to get him to agree to stay on at Greendale as a faculty member because the current Poly Sci professor is leaving for maternity leave and they’re in a jam and Jeff is their only hope for salvation or blah, blah, blah (there were a lot of words here that Jeff stopped listening to).

  
But there is no way, not even if threatened with the deepest depths and circles of hell, that Jeff will be staying a second longer than necessary at this school - despite the many offers of free cafeteria food for life or limo service (Jeff’s pretty sure this would end up being something like the local High School Driver’s Ed class in a mini van) or what the Dean called, with a wink and a nod, “turn down service.” Jeff didn’t ask for details on whatever  _that_  meant, only got up and walked out of the office without a word.

  
“I did  _not_.”

  
The Dean tilts toward him, “I just assumed your silence from before was a speechless, “yes!” He punches his fist into the air for emphasis.

  
“Noooo. It was a resounding  _no_. And the job is neither prestigious nor in a department. There’s one teacher and she spends the majority of her time showing the class old footage of the OJ Simpson trial. Make no mistake. After today, I won’t be returning. Ever. Got it?”

  
“Well then.” The Dean is visibly struck down by this. “I see your years here at Greendale have meant nothing to you. We’ve only prepared you for the greater world beyond and this is the thanks we get. I see. Carry on then.” He slowly begins to inch away and around the corner, but he leans his head back as if waiting for Jeff to suddenly change his mind. Jeff turns quickly, shooting him a glare. The Dean squeaks and scurries away.

  
“I think you hurt his feelings.”

  
“Well, I’m sorry Britta, but I’m not going to accept a job at this school just so the Dean’s  _feelings_  aren’t hurt.”

  
Everyone’s casting side-glances at each other and he can practically feel disapproval radiating through the air. He sighs. “So, Abed, graduation?”

  
Abed snaps to attention. “Yes. Everyone meet on the football field in an hour. Troy and I have this covered.” The two of them disappear in the direction of the theater department and everyone else wanders away, leaving Jeff standing alone in the hallway feeling oddly like he’s just made some kind of huge mistake.  
  
  


~*~*~*~

__  
  
August 21, 2011  
  


It was Community College so of course they weren’t going to be there forever and Jeff even had a countdown clock app on his phone that he stared at in class sometimes, but it was still a surprise when Annie showed up to study group one day and announced, with a trembling voice, that she was transferring. She had been accepted to a school three hours away and it wasn’t Ivy League but her eyes got bright when she talked about getting an apartment and a roommate and having to buy mundane things like that little plastic holder for silverware. They all cheered for her and Shirley took her shopping and Abed made her watch marathons of every college movie known to man, but a weird pall fell over everything and made her last few months in town seem oddly subdued.

  
She left on a Sunday, one of the hottest days of summer. Her hair was pulled back in a knot to keep it off her neck and she kind of bounced around with nerves, checking and rechecking to make sure she had everything – everything including four different state maps, a batch of Shirley’s brownies and a collection of compilation CD’s from Britta that were sure to be filled with angry chick rock from the late 90’s.

  
It was a strangely tearless good bye and her lip only barely trembled as Shirley and Britta enfolded her in a three way hug and Shirley cried, “I’m gonna miss my pumpkin.”

  
She and Abed did their handshake and winked at each other and Troy nodded at her and said, “It’s pretty cool you got so hot.” At this she almost paused and something of the old Annie flickered across her face but then she just blushed and moved on to maneuvering out of a hug with Pierce.

  
When she got to Jeff he smiled, holding out his arms and she fell into them, turning her head into his chest. “I’ll miss you,” she murmured so quietly that he almost just felt the vibrations of her words rather than heard them.

  
“I’ll miss you too.” He bent down and briefly brushed his lips against the top of her head and then she was pulling away and smiling one last time.

  
They all stood in a line and watched her car disappear around the corner and it felt like the end of something but not even Abed could bring himself to say anything about what it all meant.  
  


~*~*~*~

 

Jeff shows up at the football field to find six chairs lined up facing toward the scoreboard. A large boom box stands nearby next to the French National flag. (At Jeff’s questioning glance Troy explains that the French classroom was the only open classroom with an appropriately sized flag and that the flag was necessary because it provided authentication).

  
Abed hands him a robe with red and gold lining that reads “Gryffindor” under an embroidered lion in a coat of arms. Jeff sighs, “Is it even worth asking  _why_?” 

  
“We needed gowns or robes of some sort and the theater department already stored away all their costumes. But I remembered that I had seen the Harry Potter Club wearing some during their last Quidditch match.”

  
“Of course.” He looks at Britta’s robe and raises an eyebrow. “Slytherin?”

  
“Shut up,” she growls at him.

  
Pierce takes a closer look at Shirley’s robe. He points, “Ha! Now  _that’s_  inappropriate.”

  
Everyone looks and Britta sighs, “That’s a badger.  _Not_  a beaver Pierce.”  
  
  
Abed makes a signal and Troy runs onto the field, presses play on the stereo and then runs back. The faint strains of Pomp and Circumstance drift towards them.

  
Britta snorts and Shirley starts giggling as Jeff shakes his head. There really are no words for this kind of absurdity. He wishes that this were actually the weirdest thing they had done in their four years here. But it doesn’t even compete.

  
They “process” to their seats, Shirley and Britta practically in hysterics the entire time, Pierce muttering something in the back about why he didn’t get to be a lion like Jeff.

  
Before they sit Shirley leads them in the Pledge of Allegiance.

  
“Why am I pledging allegiance to the French flag?” Jeff whispers out of the side of his mouth to Britta.

  
“Shut up.” But she’s still trying to hold back laughter.

  
Abed nods toward Jeff, “Would you like to say a few words?”

  
“Uh. No. Why?”

  
“We need a commencement speech. On television this is usually done by the Valedictorian. Annie would do it if she were here. But you’re kind of our leader, so that works too.

  
Dammit. He just had to throw in that “ _you’re our leader, we look up to you, we depend on you_ ” thing that always makes Jeff do things he doesn’t want to be doing.

  
“Okaaayyy,” He stands slowly and faces his friends. “Um. Hi.” They look back at him expectantly. Britta is smirking.

  
“Look, I just want to say… I guess that, I’ve never been so thankful to have been turned down by a woman before.” He glances over at Britta and her face relaxes into a true smile. “And that I’m glad you guys let me back into the group.” He thinks about it, “You know, the eight or so times you kicked me out.”

  
They all laugh.

  
“So, thanks I guess. For being my friends and putting up with my crap and just being you. Cause you’re all a little weird. But, I’m starting to realize that I am too.” Everyone nods at this.

  
He laughs, looks down at the grass. “So, to the Greendale Class of 2013 I say, go and… I don’t know…make your dreams come true.”

  
Everyone cheers as he sits down.

  
Britta looks over at him, reaches out and grabs his hand, “That was actually pretty sweet.”

  
“I’ve always been a man of words Britta.”

  
“Yeah, but you meant it this time.” 

  
He watches as Abed and Troy launch into an acoustic version of “I Believe I Can Fly” and knows that she’s right.

  

 ~*~*~*~

 

_Fall 2011_  
 

At first, the hardest part was learning how to work without her. They weren’t taking a class together anymore but it seemed strange to break tradition so they still all gathered in the library to study together once a day - or at least, this is what they attempted to do before everything unraveled five minutes into the hour and they spent the rest of the time arguing over the correct pronunciation of the word “vase” or whether it was correct to say “pop” or “soda” or, in one weird session, which Jonas Brother would have the most successful career.

  
Jeff always assumed that  _he_  was the one holding the puppet strings of the group but this was apparently not the entirely the case – and he was a little perturbed at how much this actually upset him.

  
In a moment of desperation, after a session in which Troy cried and Shirley left in a huff after smacking Pierce over the head with her purse, he called Annie.

  
“What’s your secret?” 

  
“There’s no secret Jeff. It’s all about determination. Make eye contact. Be formidable.”

  
 She was maybe teasing him a little bit and he couldn’t help but smile.

  
“I don’t know Jeff. It always just worked before.”

  
“Well obviously this is a two person job. I get control and shut them up. You instill the good behaviors. You’re obviously going to have to come back.”

  
When she was quiet on the other side of the line Jeff wished he hadn’t said anything, he knew that this was hard enough for her.

  
“You’re liking it there?”

  
“Yeah, I think I am.”

  
“Good.”

  
Ten minutes later as they were about to hang up Annie said, “You can always call you know. Anytime…. No one’s really called.”

  
She was trying not to sound desperate as she said this but Jeff heard it for what it was and realized that they had all been spending so much time trying to pretend that everything was the same that they had been neglecting to deal with the things that had changed.

  
The next day he suggested that they drop the whole “study group” thing and just make a point to hang out together as friends. It felt a little like breaking up with someone but in the end it was maybe better because they stopped fighting so much and when he walked into the cafeteria each day and saw the five of them around a table it felt like escape.

  
One day he slipped in an offhanded remark that it had been a few weeks since Annie left and he wondered how she was and there were a couple guilty looks around the table when no one answered.

  
The next time he talked to her though she was laughing as she told him about the series of inappropriate emails she received from Pierce and the two-hour three-way phone conversation she'd had with Shirley and Britta.

  
And slowly, things began to slide into a new normal.

 

~*~*~*~

 

It saves on gas money for all six of them to pile into Shirley’s van for the three-hour drive to visit Annie but by the end Jeff decides that nothing is worth that kind of torture. Somehow, three hours turns into four and a half hours and by the time they’re pulling into the parking lot of the hotel he’s ready to drop to his knees and kiss the pavement.

  
The combination of Abed and Troy playing every car game known to mankind and Pierce insisting on singing (the wrong, more sexually explicit lyrics to) campfire songs like “On Top of Old Smokey” and Shirley trying to tune them all out by blasting her favorite Christian radio station, had left Jeff one step away from throwing himself into oncoming traffic on the middle of the highway.

  
Britta’s the only one that he doesn’t want to murder, until he catches whiff of the toxic fumes emanating from her breath and suddenly realizes that the clear liquid in her water bottle is  _not_  actually water…. And now he just wants to kill her for not sharing.

  
He grabs his bag from the trunk and growls, “I’m going to check in.”

  
The lobby of the hotel is cool and as soon as he hits the air conditioning he thinks of locking himself in his room and taking a shower and staying far away from everyone else for the next few hours. He needs silence and space and…

  
“Jeff!”

  
He knows that voice, can’t help the way his lips quirk up as he turns around and then there’s a flash of brown hair and something tiny barreling into him, throwing her arms around him and almost knocking him backwards off his feet. 

  
“Whoa. Whoa.” But he’s laughing and hugging her back, pulling her up so that her feet dangle several inches off the ground. Annie squeezes him back tightly.

  
“It’s so good to see you,” she squeals in his ear.

  
“Annie. I talked to you like two days ago.”

  
She pulls away and he deposits her back to the ground, “It’s not the same.”

  
They smile at each other.

  
“What are you doing here?”

  
“I knew you guys were going to be getting here this afternoon. I wanted to surprise you. I thought you’d be here earlier.”

  
The smile falls off Jeff’s face. “Troy apparently has the smallest bladder in recorded history. We had to stop at every rest stop on the way here."

  
“Aww.” She pats his arm, “I told you so.”

  
“I don’t really want to talk about it. Or ever relive it.”

  
“You’re going to have to go back the same way you know. Unless of course you’re willing to pay three-hundred dollars for a cab ride.” Her eyes practically twinkle as she teases him and he shakes his head at her.

  
“Oh trust me, it would be worth it this ti-”

  
“Annie!” The rest of the group straggle into the lobby and surround her with hugs.

  
“Oh you guys, thank you guys so much for coming. You have no idea what this means to me.”

  
Jeff leaves them to their reunion and heads toward the front desk. He’s checking in when Britta appears next to him, wobbling slightly so that she leans into his shoulder a little bit.

  
He levels her with a glare. “Hey drunky.”

  
“Shh.” She hold her finger to her lips. “I don’t want Shirley to know.”

  
“Britta, I hate to break it to you but  _everyone_  knows you’re drunk. Even...” He looks at the desk clerk’s nametag, “Donald here, knows you’re drunk. Right Donald?” 

  
Donald glances between them but just smiles and hands Jeff his key.

  
Britta rolled her eyes, “Whatever, you’re just jealous. But, hey.” She leans in so close she practically has her face pressed against his arm. “She seems okay, right?”

  
They look over to where Annie is talking animatedly with Abed.

  
“Yeah, she seems fine.”

  
“Seems or is?”

  
“What’s the difference?”

  
“When it comes to Annie? Huge difference.”

  
“Britta.” Jeff takes his key and hoists his bag over his shoulder. “She’s fine. Okay?”

  
“Okay.” She shrugs. “But you should keep an eye on her. Take care of her, or whatever it is you usually do.” And then she stumbles again.

  
“What is  _wrong_  with you?”

  
“Nothing. What’s wrong with you?” They stare at each other until Jeff looks up to the ceiling in exasperation.

  
“I’m going to my room.”

  
“Jeff!” Annie calls out to him and he looks back reluctantly. “We’re meeting in the hotel bar at 6:00?”

  
It’s a question but it’s accompanied by wide, blue, unblinking Little Mermaid eyelashes and she knows he’s going to say yes anyway so he just narrows his eyes at her, mutters “yeah, yeah, yeah” and stalks off toward the elevator.

 

~*~*~*~

 

_Fall 2011_

“I met someone.”

  
He was the TA in her Literature course so she got to know him right away because she always had a million questions when class was over and he always just smiled and answered everything and sometimes even called on her in class to expand on some point she had made about the symbolism of water in Chopin’s  _The Awakening_.

  
There were times she didn’t really have any questions but stayed and talked to him anyway and found out things like, he was in the Master’s English program and he loved jazz music but hated olives on his pizza (she found this last one out after he invited her to dinner one Friday night). She also found out that he doesn’t kiss on first dates, but apparently she  _does_  and when she pulled away he was smiling and maybe blushing a little. 

  
“What?”

  
“I met someone. A guy.”

  
“Well I’m glad to hear they have  _guys_  at your school now.”

  
“Jeff. I’m serious.”

  
The stop light ahead of him flickered to yellow and he slowly eased his foot down on the brake, tapped his thumb on the steering wheel in time to the music playing on the radio

  
“Um. Okay." 

  
“I think I really like him.”

  
“Well, that’s…” He shifted uncomfortably, “Why are you telling me this? Isn’t this more of a Shirley thing? Or Britta even? I’m the friend you call when you, I don’t know, need a flat tire changed.”

  
Annie laughed, “Do you even know how to change a flat tire?”

  
“That’s beside the point.”

  
The light turned to green as Annie sighed, “I just wanted to tell you. I’m sorry. It was silly.”

  
“No. It’s… so this guy. He’s a good guy? What’s his name?” He grimaced into the review mirror.

  
“David. And yes.”

  
“David. I guess that sounds like a fairly decent non-douchebag name.”

  
“Yes. He is a non-douchebag.” There was a smile in her voice.

  
“Good.” He flicked on the turn signal and glanced over his shoulder before merging into the right lane.

  
“Jeff! Are you driving?”

  
“Yes.”

  
“How many times do I have to tell you not to talk on your phone in the car? It’s dangerous.”

  
“ _You_  called  _me_.”

  
“I didn’t know you were driving. I’m hanging up now.”

  
“Annie, I’ve been driving the entire span of your lifetime. I think I’m fine." 

  
“I don’t know Jeff, senior citizens cause just as many accidents as teenage drivers.”

  
“Wow. Low blow.”

  
“I’m hanging up now.”

  
“Fine… hey, Annie?”

  
“Yeah?”

  
“He’s a good guy?”

  
“Yeah, he is.”

  
“Good.”


	2. Chapter 2

_Part II_

_home is wherever I’m with you_

~*~*~*~

 

A long hot shower, a change of clothes and a nap have helped ease Jeff from his post-road trip funk and he leans back in his seat feeling relaxed and easy. The ice in his scotch clinks together as he tilts his glass this way and that way before taking a sip, enjoying the taste on his tongue, the warm burn as it slides down his throat. 

  
He looks at Abed across the bar-height table they've claimed in the corner, watches him scribble furiously into a notepad. “What are you doing?”

  
“Taking notes.” He looks up. “I admit. I’m a little confused. I’m not sure how this is going to play out. See, Jeff, finales are tricky. They very rarely reach the high expectations of the audience and they’re so often ruined by cliché moments of sentimentality or disappointing answers to mythological questions.”

  
Jeff nods. He’s used to this by now, to playing along, to maybe getting swept up in Abed’s surreal cinematic take on life. “And what mythological questions need to be answered in our world?”

  
Abed pauses, “Exactly. There are no unanswered questions. There’s no last minute obstacle that needs to be cleared. And the focal couple of the series have already resolved their sexual tension and realized they’re better off as friends. I’m not sure what else can happen. Unless you think we’ve all actually died and this is just some kind of middle afterlife we’ve dreamed up so we can be together again.”

  
“Yeaaahhh, I’m going to go with no on that one.”

  
Britta plops down at the table with her drink. “Jeff. I’m surprised to see you here. There’s a table over there of barely legal wannabe skanks who have been giving you the eye all night long. How have you not already gotten on that?” She tilts her head, “Lost your game old man?”

  
Jeff doesn’t even need to look over to see what she’s talking about. The girls in question  _had_  caught his eye earlier and while he can appreciate some of what they are throwing down, their proclivity for shrieking every time a Lady Gaga song plays on the jukebox borders on headache inducing. But he’s not about to admit this to Britta. He takes a sip of his scotch, peering over the glass toward the bar where Shirley and Annie are huddled close together whispering.

  
“I’m biding my time. Drop a few winks here, a couple nods there and pretty soon they’ll be eating out of the palm of my hand.” He leers at Britta suggestively.

  
“Uggh. You’re gross, you know that?”

  
“Don’t deny your feelings Britta. You know you want another-” He’s cut off as she claps her hand over his mouth.

  
“Please don’t say anything that’s going me make me want to throw my drink in your face.”

  
“Jeff and Britta pretend to be mildly repulsed by each other but really they are both lost in the overwhelming emotion of how they are going to miss this back and forth, this unlikely friendship that started-”

  
“Abed!”

  
“Sorry.”

  
~*~*~*~   
  
  


_November 2011_   
  


Annie brought David with her when she came home for Thanksgiving and they all got together at Shirley’s that Saturday to meet him and find out if he was as “sweet” as she had been claiming for the past few months.

  
He was tall and wiry and seemed a little shy at first surrounded by these people who were loud and opinionated and half-crazy but pretty soon he was talking with Abed about his sister who was in film school at USC and arguing with Troy about which BCS conference had the best chance at the championship Bowl Game that year. At some point he made an off-handed comment about a summer he spent building orphanages in Haiti with some church group and both Britta and Shirley seemed to visibly melt and suddenly David was the honorary eighth member of their group.

  
Pierce seemed to be the only real holdout and he muttered to Jeff as they were standing in the doorway of the kitchen, “We already have enough men in this group.”

  
“Well Pierce, maybe next time Annie will bring home a girl for you.

  
As soon the words left his mouth he regretted it and Pierce’s eyebrows waggled suggestively. “College  _is_ a time of experimentation. Isn’t that right Britta?” He called out the last part loudly.

  
Britta didn’t even look up, “I don’t even know what you’re talking about, but the answer is no.”

  
Jeff took a pull of his beer and watched Annie as she moved across the room and sat next to David. They turned toward each other, talking quietly as she smiled and reached up to curl her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck. Something made him laugh loudly and his hand came up to rest on her knee. For a moment it seemed that they were both completely oblivious to anything else in the room.

  
And later (not that it really mattered because it was enough that she was really, authentically happy) Jeff ended up standing near him in the living room as David talked about how he was thinking about going into law and Jeff actually kind of liked this guy and he wasn’t sure why he was so surprised.

  
When he hugged Annie as she was leaving and whispered, “He _is_  a good guy, definitely not a douchebag,” he really truly meant it.  
  


~*~*~*~

 

Annie giggles, leaning into his arm. Jeff looks down at her with a smile. “Oh laugh it up. Remind me again, who was it that slammed my head into a table? Twice?”

  
She winces and reaches up to feather her fingers across his temple. “I apologized for that!”

  
“I had a headache for three days.”

  
“That  _was_  pretty scary,” Troy says with wide eyes. Then he stops, thinks about it. “But also weirdly hot.”

  
“Why is it that when a woman asserts her power in any way, it’s always misconstrued as being of a sexual nature?” Britta breaks in.

  
Troy turns toward her, “Britta, I’m not even sure exactly what you just said, but I’m pretty sure it was the opposite of cool. Why can’t something just be hot because it’s hot?”

  
Britta looks confused as she tries to follow his logic. Jeff snorts, “Well, speaking as the person whose head was smashed into the table, it was  _not_  hot. It just hurt like hell.” He glares at Annie again.

  
“Jeff, I was just trying to assert my badassness.”

  
“Well, badassness asserted. Please don’t use my face to do it next time.”

  
Troy snorts, “Now  _that’s_  what she said.”

  
Everyone stares at him, except Britta who laughs. “That kind of works actually.” A split second later she looks around the table, mortified, “Oh God. Please don’t tell Pierce.”

  
Troy’s still laughing to himself, “I’ve got to hand it to him, that joke _is_  still funny.”

  
“Where _is_  Pierce?” Annie asks as she scans the bar.

  
“I think he went to bed a while ago.” Jeff stops. “Actually, his words were, ‘The female moans of pleasure you hear tonight coming down the hall will be from my room…. But. I’m pretty sure that’s Pierce Code for I’m tired and I’m going to catch an episode of Murder She Wrote before turning in.” 

  
Annie laughs but then someone at the table next to them suddenly bumps into her from behind and her drink goes splashing across the table. On either side, Troy and Jeff reach out to hold her steady and then turn to face the culprit. 

  
“Oh man, I am so sorry. I wasn’t watching where I was going. Are you okay?”

  
She turns around and finds herself looking up at a guy that is all chiseled jaw and blue eyes. His shaggy blonde hair falls across his forehead as he smiles down at her.

  
“Oh. Um. I’m fine.”

  
He glances down and then back up, eyes trailing over her body. “You’ve got that right.”

  
Annie’s smile falters and her eyes widen a little. Britta lets out a derisive snort.

  
Chiseled Jaw looks at Annie’s drink which is now dripping onto the floor in a puddle. “I guess that’s my fault. How ‘bout I buy you another one over at the bar? He glances down again but this time his eyes don’t make it any further than the neckline of her shirt.  

  
“No thank you?” Annie grimaces then instinctively leans back toward Jeff who takes his cue and throws his arm around her shoulder.

  
“ _Babe_. I’m going to the bar, you want anything?”

  
She gazes up at him with an exaggerated look of schmoopiness, “Thanks  _babe_. My usual?”

  
“You got it.”

  
He squeezes her shoulder and casts a warning stare toward the guy as he skirts past him toward the bar.

  
Chiseled Jaw looks confused for a second, then casts his sights on Britta.

  
“Hey gorgeous.”

  
She rolls her eyes and turns her back on him. “Yeah right.”

  
Jeff leans over the bar to get the bartender’s attention. “Scotch and a Ketel Cranberry. Thanks.”

  
“And a beer.” Troy calls out as he joins him.

  
They both look back at the table where Annie and Britta are actively ignoring Chiseled Jaw as they lean across the table and giggle. He looks momentarily annoyed and then heads over to the group of barely legal girls who all giggle at the sight of his approach.

  
“You guys are weirdly good at that.”

  
“What?”

  
“You and Annie. That fake boyfriend girlfriend thing you do. It’s weird.”

  
Jeff shrugs, “Is it? It’s not like we do it all the time.” 

  
“That’s why it’s weird.”

  
Jeff looks at him, “What?”

  
Troy stares back, “What?”

  
“Nothing.”

  
People are being weird today. Jeff feels confused. “I think you’ve been hanging out with Britta too much.” 

  
Troy turns to him with wide eyes, “Why? What did you hear?”

  
And now he’s even more confused. “What?” 

  
“Nothing,” Troy says slowly, pulling back to look at Jeff through narrowed eyes.

  
They stare at each other until Troy’s gaze shifts away. “She’s kinda hot right?”

  
“Annie?”

  
“Britta.”

  
“Oh.” Jeff pinches the bridge of his nose. Maybe he’s already had enough to drink today. “Yeah. Well _, yeah_. But I thought you said she needed a haircut. Or something. To consider it.”

  
“Yeah, I did. But it’s weird. It’s like the more I get to know her, the hotter she gets. Maybe she’s wearing different makeup or something.”

  
“Or you know, it could be that the things you’re getting to know about her make her  _seem_ evenhotter to you.”

  
Troy pauses, “Whoa. That makes sense. Hey, maybe that’s what happened to Annie.”

  
“What do you mean?”

  
“Annie was  _not_  hot in high school. But I didn’t  _know_  Annie in high school. But  _now_  I know her and she’s all hot and everything. So… does that mean she was  _always_  hot? But I’m only seeing it now that I know she’s a pretty cool chick?”

  
Jeff nods slowly, “According to your logic here. Yes.”

  
“Wow. This is wrinkling my brain. I should tell Abed about this. He could totally use this in one of his movies.”

  
The bartender sets their drinks in front of them and Troy drifts back towards the table with his beer but Jeff just stares back down at the vodka cranberry sitting in front of him, trying to figure out why suddenly everything seems so muddled. 

**~*~*~*~  
**

****  
  


_December 2011_

 

Jeff and Britta started meeting out for drinks every Friday night. And sometimes Saturdays. And an occasional Tuesday. Or Wednesday. Or Thursday.

  
One morning she just woke up in his bed and it wasn’t altogether unexpected. Neither was the fact that it happened again a week later and then two days after that and then suddenly she had a toothbrush at his place and she started stocking his favorite cereal in her pantry.

  
There was a steadiness to it that they both appreciated and needed, and they knew each other well enough that they just sort of skipped over all the quirks and novelties of a new relationship (which they both claimed to hate anyway). So when he hogged the covers she had no qualms about stealing them back and then pushing him off the bed and when she tried to get him to go to an art show with her he didn’t think twice before laughing derisively and giving an unequivocal  _no._   

  
It felt anticlimactic when he reached to hold her hand in the hallway for the first time (and unsurprising when she jerked away at first and then said, “oh, yeah, okay”) and the “Britta and I are dating” conversation was met with a chorus of  _it’s about time_  and  _oh, that’s nice_  and  _wait, weren’t you guys already dating_?

  
It didn’t take long before they were just  _Jeff and Britta_  - one of those couples that just made sense together, even if sometimes it felt to Jeff like he had discovered some kind of weird narcissistic way to date himself.

 

~*~*~*~

 

By 11:30 everyone but Annie, Jeff and Britta has gone to bed and the entire bar has quieted down, leaving only a few scattered patrons watching Sport Center highlights and a couple in the corner, heads bent close to each other over a table.

  
“Five bucks says that’s his secretary and his wife’s at home putting the kids to bed.” 

  
“Jeff!” Annie smacks his shoulder, “Why do you have to assume the worst?”

  
“She’s right, you know.  _Some_  men are capable of thinking with something other than…” Britta glances towards his lap.

  
“Hey. I’m just reading the situation. He’s in a hotel bar, on a weeknight, wearing a business suit, he checks his phone under the table every five minutes or so. These things add up to one conclusion.”

  
“Don’t listen to him Annie. This is coming from the guy that slept with Pierce’s stepdaughter after knowing her for two hours.”

  
Annie nods seriously, “And that cougar with the collagen lips and the obnoxious kid.”

  
“Twice.”

  
Jeff glances back and forth between them in bewilderment. He raises an eyebrow at Britta, “This isn’t looking too good on  _you_  right now either you know.”

  
Her eyes light up in challenge. “Coming from the guy who kissed one of my best friends five minutes after I told him I loved him?”

  
Jeff chokes, his eyes shooting over to Annie who freezes with her drink halfway to her lips.

  
“You told her?!” he cried.

  
Annie sputters then turns to Britta, “I told you not to tell him!”

  
Britta glances between them and snorts. “I thought it wasn’t a big deal.”

  
Jeff watches as Annie’s face flushes bright red. “I’m sorry!”

  
“Annie. Annie.” He shakes his head at her slowly.

  
“We were drinking! And it just… I don’t know, came out.”

  
Britta nods, “We  _were_  drinking. A lot. She also told me about that other time.”

  
His mouth drops open, “Oh. Um.”

  
“Oh god,” Annie moans as she covers her face with her hands.

  
Jeff stares at the top of her head. His heart is doing something weird in his chest like he’s on the verge of a panic attack and it really has nothing to do with Britta knowing these things because he knows she doesn’t really care, but the thing is –  _he’s_  not supposed to care either.

  
He levels a glare at Britta as she innocently sips her water.

  
“Doesn’t it feel better to have it all out there?”

  
Annie lets out another moan and Jeff’s lips turn up into a slow grin.

  
“Speaking of secrets being revealed. Britta, is there anything  _you’d_  like to share with the class? Maybe about someone else in the group that  _you_  made out with?”

  
Britta’s face goes pale and Annie’s hands drop back to the table. She gasps, “Britta, did you?”

  
“No! No, of course not.”

  
Annie and Jeff glance and each other and then Annie’s eyes get wide, “Oh please tell me it wasn’t Pierce.”

  
Britta scrunches up her nose. “No. It wasn’t Pierce.”

  
“Oh.” Jeff and Annie exchange another mischievous glance. “So it wasn’t Pierce. But it was  _somebody_?”

  
Britta’s mouth drops open as she realizes what they just got her to admit. “Not fair. That’s not.” She shakes her finger at them and hops off her chair. “You know what? I’m going to my room.”

  
“Britta.” They both call after her, laughing, but she’s already flounced out the door with a huff.

  
Annie grabs Jeff’s arm, “So, who is it?”

  
“I don’t know. It was actually just a hunch I had. It could be any of them.”

  
“Even Shirley?”

  
“Less likely. But still a possibility.”

  
“We have to find out.” Annie seems positively gleeful at this.

  
“My money’s on Troy.”

  
“Really?” She tilts her head in thought. “I was going to say Abed.”

  
“ _You_  didn’t hear the conversation I had at the bar earlier.”

  
“So? Have you ever seen Britta and Abed together?” She thinks about it a little bit and then nods, “They would be adorable.”

  
They spend the next five minutes arguing over who it’s more likely that Britta locked lips with and which pairing actually makes  _sense_  until they realize that it  _all_ makes sense and Annie suggests that they make Team Abed and Team Troy shirts to wear to graduation the next day.

 

~*~*~*~

 

_March 28 th 2012_

 

David was snoring softly on the other side of the bed as Annie stared at the ceiling, too amped up on adrenaline to sleep. She finally grabbed her cell phone off the nightstand and typed a quick text message.

_  
“guess what? got that internship I was telling you about”_

  
She pressed send and waited but a few minutes passed, and then a few more and she was about to give up because it was 12:30 in the morning and he was probably sleeping or…

  
The phone vibrated in her hand, startling from her thoughts, the green glow from the LCD screen illuminating the room.

 _  
“Jeff Winger Calling_.”

  
Annie shot another glance toward David as she quietly slipped out from under the sheets and tiptoed across the room, pressing the phone to her ear and whispering a “Hello?” as she stepped into the hallway.

  
“Hey,” he whispered back.

  
She couldn’t help the smile that blossomed over her face.

  
“You didn’t have to call. I just wanted to tell you-”

  
“No. It’s okay. I was awake. I… Congratulations. That’s amazing.” 

  
“Yeah.” Annie settled herself into a corner of the couch, leaving all the lights off so that the room was lit only by the faint silvery glow of moonlight from the open window.

  
“So? When do you start? What are you going to be doing exactly? Are they going to be paying you? They should pay you. I’m sure you’ll probably be running the place by the end of your first day.”

  
Annie ducked her head against the couch.

  
“Um. Two weeks. I don’t know. Probably getting people coffee or something. And no, it’s not paid. But there  _are_  job possibilities after the internship is over.”

  
“Wow. Look at that. Our Annie, already conquering the world.”

  
“Well, I wouldn’t say that-“

  
“Oh no. You would. Come on Annie. I know there’s that part of you that’s just ready to burst with self congratulation. Let it out.”

  
Annie giggled and then erupted, “It is amazing, right? They only choose one student a year and they chose  _me_  and the editor told me that they were impressed with my skills, in writing  _and_  editing, and I think… I think this could be huge. And I don’t know if it’s exactly what I want to do but it doesn’t really matter right now. Cause Annie Edison, she’s finally going places.”

  
This last part maybe came out a little too loud and Annie shot a cautionary glance toward the bedroom door but Jeff was laughing.

  
“That’s my girl.”

  
Annie flushed and pressed the phone more firmly against her ear. She sank down into the couch a little bit, “I’m sorry if I woke you up.”

  
“No. I was awake. We got in late.”

  
Annie nodded but was quiet.

  
“Did you celebrate?”

  
“We went to dinner.”

  
“Well.” She heard something like couch springs creaking, imagined him sprawled out in his apartment, or maybe Britta’s. “When you’re in town again we’ll all take you out.  _Or._ Pierce is really into bartending right now. He could make you what he is calling a “Slippery Orgasm.”

  
Annie scrunched up her nose, “Ew. No. Seriously?”

  
“Seriously. Annie, I wouldn’t joke about this. And neither would Pierce. Abed made the mistake of showing him _Cocktails_  and now he’s convinced that he’s Tom Cruise and he’s trying to learn how to sling drinks like a real bartender but he just keeps breaking glasses and ending up with 100 proof vodka all down his pants. He walks around smelling like a distillery all day.”

  
Annie giggled, “So what’s in a Slippery Orgasm?”

  
“I don’t even know. Some combination of buttershots and Kahlua and Tabasco sauce, whatever it is, it smells foul. Troy’s the only one that’s been brave enough to try it and he was sick for three days afterward.”

  
“Well, I’ll remember to stay away from Pierce and his Slippery Orgasms,” she murmured… then realized exactly what she just said. “Ughh.”

  
Jeff laughed, “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure you never have to experience one. Alcoholic or not.”

  
“Ugghh,” she repeated. “This conversation is making me feel ill.”

  
“That makes two of us.”

  
They were quiet then for a long stretch and her eyes were starting to flutter closed as she listened to his light breathing on the other side of the phone.

  
“Annie,” he whispered.

  
“Hmm?”

  
“Are you falling asleep?”

  
“No. Maybe.”

  
“Go to sleep.”

  
“M’kay. Jeff?” She roused herself out of the drifting state she was about to fall into.

  
“Yeah?”

  
“Thanks. For calling.”

  
“Anytime. And, really, I’m proud of you.”

  
“I know.”

  
“Go to sleep.”

  
“Mmm. Hmm.”

  
Jeff ended the call and settled back down into the couch with a glance toward the bedroom where Britta was sprawled out across the bed, probably snoring. He thought about the times she sometimes let him slide his hand under her skirt in public places, the joke she told at dinner that made him laugh so hard wine went up his nose, those scattered moments when she relaxed against him with her eyes closed like she could really maybe be happy.

  
He picked up the remote and flicked on the television, leaned back to watch an episode of Law and Order he had seen a hundred times, tried  _not_  to think about the countless times when she still pulled away, or her uncanny ability to cut him off and launch into an hour long diatribe about the injustices of the world when all he wanted to do was ask her advice, or that sometimes this  _look_  would flash across her eyes like maybe she was just  _bored_  with this entire thing.


	3. Chapter 3

_Part III_

_nothing new is sweeter than with you_  
  
~*~*~*~

 

 

“I’m glad you and Britta were able to stay friends.”

  
Annie’s peering into the depths of her glass, trying to fish out a piece of ice with her straw. Jeff watches her for a moment then shrugs.

  
“We were always friends. It was the whole dating thing that didn’t quite work.”

  
She successfully frees an ice cube from the confines of the glass and pops it into her mouth, sucking on it with puckered lips. “I thought you guys made a cute couple,” she finally says.

  
Jeff frowns. “On more than one occasion we had people think we were brother and sister.”

  
Annie laughs but then nods, “That makes sense actually. You certainly act like it.”

  
“There’s an insult somewhere in there isn’t there?”

  
She gasps, “Nooo.”

  
He laughs.

  
“Jeff?”

  
“Yeah?”

  
“Were you in love with her?”

  
“Annie.” He scrubs his hands over his face. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. Brita and I… it was something that just needed to happen. And me not handling it well,” he looks at her pointedly and she smiles, “I think that was me dealing with just another in a string of failures.” 

  
“Oh. But you normally handle those so well.”

  
“Hey.” He pushes lightly against her shoulder and she tilts to the side with a giggle.

  
“So,” Jeff starts a second later, trying to figure out how to broach the subject. “What about David?”

  
She pauses in trying to scoop out another piece of ice. “Did I love him?”

  
He looks up at the ceiling, not really sure  _wha_ t he’s asking.

  
“Because I did. Love him.” Her hair swings into her face and blocks her eyes as she continues to stare at the table. “A lot. But… when it came down to that moment...” She stops, shakes her head and looks up at him. Her eyes are surprisingly dry but there’s wistfulness there that makes her forehead crinkle.

  
Jeff nods and takes a deep breath. He needs to change the subject, all of this - Britta, David -  _all of it_  is making him feel antsy.

  
“So, the night you got drunk with Britta.”

  
Annie throws her hands up in the air, “I know! I’ll never drink with her again.”

  
He smirks, “Yeah, but, you don’t happen to remember making a phone call that night, do you?”

  
Her mouth is open in a little “o” shape as she stares at him. “Um.” And then she gasps, “No!”

  
“Oh yes.”

  
She’s trying to remember but there  _had_  been a lot of alcohol and talking and…. “What did we say?”

  
“Hmm. I don’t recall exactly but there  _was_  singing.”

  
“Oh my...” Then she narrows her eyes, “You saved the message didn’t you?” 

  
“Maybe.”

  
“Jeff, give me that phone.”

  
“Nah. I’m saving it for a more opportune time.”

  
“I hate you.”

  
“Be nice to me Annie. Just remember, _singing_. Lots and lots of singing.”

  
“Oh god.”

 

~*~*~*~

 

_April 19, 2012_

  
Annie spent her 21st Birthday at a wine bar downtown, surrounded by friends. She wore four-inch heels and a retro-style polka-dotted dress with a skirt that flounced prettily as she practically bounced around in happiness. The entire night she was warm and flushed, the sweet taste of wine on her tongue, David’s arm around her shoulder.

  
They didn’t pour themselves into bed until almost 3:00 but Annie was so buzzing with contentment and drunkenness that she was still wide-awake long after David had started snoring against his pillow. She finally eased herself out of bed at almost 4:30 and grabbed his shirt off the ground, where it had been discarded hastily as they made their way to the bed in a tangle of limbs and gasps and hurried kisses.

  
She turned the light on in the kitchen, blinking against the brightness. There was still a dull ringing in her ears from the music and the laughter and the wine, making everything feel echo-y. Her thoughts were muzzy, blurred around the edges but she smiled when she saw the two vases of flowers on the table.

  
The roses, a dozen, from David – she had woken to find them on the pillow next to her with a note that read simply, “I love you.”

  
The other one had arrived early in the afternoon, a wild and colorful arrangement of lilies and chrysanthemums and Gerber daisies, along with a package from the bakery and a note reading, “Happy 21st Birthday Annie! We miss you. Wish we could be there. Love, Shirley, Britta, Jeff, Troy, Abed and Pierce.” 

  
Annie opened the bakery box and pulled out a cupcake frosted with deep purple swirls of butter cream. She poured a glass of milk and perched herself on the counter, eyes closing as she took the first sugary bite and when a few bits of cake fell to her lap and then to the floor she didn’t even mind. Halfway through – and she was trying to make this last as long as possible, savoring every bite – she grabbed her phone and dialed into her voicemail.

  
“You have five saved messages.”

  
“Hey babe, I had to leave for work early and I didn’t want to wake you but I just wanted to say Happy Birthday and I hope you enjoy the flowers.” He laughed, “I’ll probably end up talking to you before you get this but I love you and I hope you have an amazing day. I’ll see you tonight.”

  
“Happy Birthday sweetie! We sent you a little something you should be getting later today. I wish I could hug you right now. But I’ll see you soon okay? I love you!”

  
Annie smiled, mentally pulling up a picture of Shirley that she allowed herself to sink into for a moment.

  
“Hi Annie, it’s mom. Your dad and I are just calling to say Happy Birthday. We hope you have a lovely day. Please… please be safe tonight. Call us later when you get a chance.”

  
The next message was a loud and raucous rendition of the Happy Birthday song that ended with Abed and Troy singing, _“And many more, on channel four. And Scooby-Doo, on channel two. And Frankenstein, on channel nine. And a big fat lady, on channel eighty.”_  In the background she could hear laughter and Jeff’s voice saying, “Guys, seriously, she’s turning twenty-one, not eight.” 

  
Annie played this one over again, twice, her eyes prickling with tears, before switching to the last message, received only three hours ago.

  
“Hey Annie, it’s Britta, I know you’re probably out partying right now but Jeff insisted that we call…  _ow, stop it_ … he says to be safe…  _what are you, her dad?.... OW…_ and to watch out for men in capes?….  _I don’t even know what that means, you guys are so weird_ … you know what Annie? Just delete this entire message. Jeff might be, and by “might be” I mean “is”, a little drunk right now. Pierce is trying to get rid of all the alcohol that he bought last month and these geniuses decided it would be a great idea to drink all of it. In one night…  _Yes you are, dumbass_ … so just forget this ever happened…  _Okay! I’ll tell her!_...  Happy birthday Annie. Seriously, I apologize for this.”

  
She ended up eating another cupcake and listening to all the messages again before finally crawling back into bed, the voices of her friends drifting through her mind until she fell soundly to sleep.

 

~*~*~*~

 

Annie’s telling him a story about some of her co-workers at the paper when the lights suddenly flicker and the bartender says, “Last call!”

  
They both look up, started and Jeff checks his phone. “Wow. I didn’t realize how late it was. We should probably…”

  
“Yeah.” She nods and starts to reach for her wallet but he stills her hand. “I got it.”

  
“No. It’s okay-” But he’s already smiling and heading toward the front.

  
Annie watches as he leans over the bar, talking easily with the female bartender. The sudden urge to go over and stand near him, maybe curl her hand around his arm, catches her off guard and makes her clutch her purse so hard her knuckles turn white.

  
They make it to the hotel lobby when he looks down at her. “You can’t drive.”

  
“I know. I was going to call a cab.”

  
“That’s stupid. Just stay here.”

  
She pauses. There’s an unspoken  _with me_  in his words and she has to swallow hard before nodding.

  
They head toward the elevator and Annie keeps hold of his arm the entire ride up and then through the hallway to his room. They are both quiet but everything else seems so much louder and more pronounced than normal - elevator doors swishing open, their shoes on the carpet, the click when the door unlocks as Jeff swipes his keycard.

  
The room is dark and cool, with the lingering mustiness that hotel rooms always seem to have. Annie follows Jeff in, standing almost awkwardly in the entrance as he slips off his watch and starts unbuttoning the cuffs of his sleeves.

  
“Um. Make yourself at home I guess.” He glances around the room, which is simple - just a television atop the dresser, a corner table with a chair and a Queen sized bed where the comforter is still rumpled from his nap earlier.

  
Annie wanders over to the window where the flickering lights of the city are visible, and presses her fingertips to the glass, her breath leaving a small circle of fog as she gazes at the street below.

  
Jeff watches her for a moment, the shape of her, silhouetted against the light from the city before turning into the bathroom and flipping the light on. 

  
“I don’t have any pajamas,” she calls out to him.

  
“I probably have an extra shirt you can borrow.”

  
He’s brushing his teeth when he walks out a few minutes later to find her rummaging through his bag.

  
“Uh. Excuse me,” he garbles out over a mouth full of toothpaste.

  
She just shrugs and pulls out a faded gray tee shirt that reads,  _Royal Valley High School_. “Jeff, how old is this shirt?” But then something flashes across her face and she quickly adds a “nevermind” and stands up with it clutched to her chest. He just stares at her, then turns and walks back into the bathroom.

  
Annie trails after him, lingering in the doorway to wait her turn and when he glances up and sees her reflection in the mirror, she’s looking down at the shirt in her hand, running her thumb along the smooth and well-worn material with this expression of such complete  _fondness_ that Jeff’s breath catches in his throat.

 

~*~*~*~

_  
May 15 th 2012, 1:24am_

“Jeff?”

  
“Heeeyyyy.”

  
Annie held her hand over her chest and took a steadying breath, lowering the bat she was gripping tightly in her hand. “What are you doing here?”

  
He leaned into her doorway and pursed his lips. “Umm. I’m not sure. I gave the guy your address and now I’m here. Can I come in or….?”

  
“Yeah.” She moved aside and watched as he staggered in and flopped down, face first, onto the couch.

  
“Jeff? You took a cab here?”

  
He rolled over and tried to sit up but only ended up leaning half on, half off the couch, his head on the arm rest, his feet on the floor.

  
“Annie. Does it look like I’m in any condition to drive?”

  
“But from Greendale? That must have cost you like two hundred dollars!”

  
“Three hundred.”

  
“Jeff!”

  
He squinted, his nose scrunching up in pain. “Don’t yell.”

  
She walked around and perched on the other side of the couch. “What’s wrong?”

  
“Pshaw. Nothing. Oh hey.” He opened his eyes and looked around. “Where’s that guy?”

  
“ _That guy?_ You mean David? My  _boyfriend_?”

  
“Yeah, him. What’s his name again?”

  
Annie sighed in exasperation. “David.”

  
“Yeah. He’s a good guy. I like him.”

  
“Well, I’m so glad he has your approval. And he’s studying for finals.” She waited a moment. “Jeff? Are you okay?”

  
“Totally fine.”

  
“Britta called me.”

  
His jaw tensed. “Britta who?”

  
“Jeff.”

  
“Yeah, so we broke up. Big deal. Like it matters to me.”

  
“Well it must matter some for you to end up here.”

  
He was quiet and Annie finally sighed and got up. “Fine. I’m going back to bed.”

  
She threw him a blanket from the hall closet, then turned off the light and disappeared into her room. Jeff blinked into the darkness, trying to get a hold on the way everything above him was starting to spin in circles.

_  
Fuck._

  
The room was still spinning, just slower (and maybe that was worse) a half an hour later when he heard her bedroom door open again and then her feet padding against the hardwood floor. She came into view and sat on the edge of the coffee table across from him, resting her chin in her hand and waiting silently. 

  
Jeff shifted on the couch and stretched out all the way so that his feet hung off the other armrest. He rolled his head to look at her and when he focused on her it seemed to help steady everything else out so that his stomach stopped churning quite so much.

  
It was another minute or so before he said anything but she just continued to wait.

  
Finally:

  
“Look, it’s not like I thought it was ever going to work. I’m mean, like that happily ever, sunset, princess, knight and shining armor, movie – Abed would know what I’m talking about.”

  
“I get it Jeff.”

  
Through the darkness he could only just begin to make out her features as she continued to watch him.

  
“I mean, you know Britta and me and… yeah, you get it right? But she’s my friend and she’s  _Britta_  and she was the reason for this entire thing and I thought… maybe.” He fell silent. 

  
“Jeff-”

  
“It hurts.” 

  
She paused. “I know.”

  
“I  _hate_  that it hurts.”

  
“I know.”

  
He was quiet so she got up and walked into the kitchen. There was the sound of a cabinet opening and closing and then water running.

  
“Fuck. I spent three hundred dollars on a cab ride.”

  
Annie laughed, “Well how about we find you a cheaper way to get home tomorrow?” She came back and set down a glass of water and a bottle of Advil.

  
He snorted, “Thanks.”

  
She bent down and he felt her hand slip against his and squeeze lightly. “Anytime.” 

  
After she went back to her bedroom Jeff found himself staring at the glass of water, strangely comforted by it and the faint memory of the touch of her hand against his skin.

 

~*~*~*~

 

 

When Annie comes out of the bathroom she’s pulled her hair up into a ponytail and washed her face so that her cheeks are soft and pink, her wide blue eyes framed only by the slightest smudge of mascara. Jeff’s eyes trace her movement as she walks across the room and sets her neatly folded top next to her purse. She’s wearing his shirt and it hangs loosely on her frame, dropping to her mid thigh and even though she’s still wearing jeans, he quickly averts his eyes.

  
She turns toward him, teeth worrying at her bottom lip as she looks at the bed, at him stretched out  _on the bed_ , wearing jeans and a blue tee-shirt.

  
“Is that what you normally sleep in?”

  
“No.”

  
“Oh.” She flushes, recalling that she didn’t see any sort of pajama bottoms in his bag. “Well,” she collects herself and says brightly, “At least we’ll both be uncomfortable tonight.” And then she crawls onto the bed next to him and pulls her knees up to her chest.

  
Jeff laughs as the tension drains from him body. He reaches for the remote control, “At least.”

  
He flips through the channels but nothing good is on so he ends up settling for some old Stephen King movie with Emilio Estevez where all the electronics in the world come alive and start killing people.

  
Annie watches in silence for about five minutes before she turns to him with a dubious frown. “This seems implausible to me.”

  
Jeff snorts, “Which part? The driverless monster trucks mowing people down or the vending machines shooting soda cans at innocent Little Leaguers?”

  
“Well, all of it. But why would _all_  the electronics suddenly want to kill us? So the moon aligns with something one day and my hair dryer comes alive. What did I ever do to it that would make it want to wrap its cord around my neck and strangle me to death?”

  
He pretends to think. ‘Have you ever thanked your hair dryer Annie? For a job well done?”

  
“No. You’re right. I’ve been a terrible slave driver all these years.” She shakes her head sadly and sighs.

  
They watch as onscreen a rogue meat slicer tries to cut off someone’s hand.

  
“Jeff?” She asks suddenly, “What are you going to do now?”

  
“What do you mean?"

  
“Well. Everyone else has these plans. Shirley and her sister are opening a business, Abed’s got that film festival next month and you know it’s only a matter of time before the world discovers what kind of crazy genius he is. Britta’s going to keep working for that non-profit group… But what are you going to do?

  
“Um. Go back to being an awesome lawyer? I thought that was kind of a given.”

  
“Yeah, but.” She turns toward him a bit, “Is that how it works? Do you just go back to being a lawyer? Where? At a law firm? Is your old one going to take you back?”

  
Jeff is quiet. He stares at the television, turning the remote control over and over in his hand.

  
“No. It’s actually _not_  that easy,” he finally lets out. “I called my old firm and about a hundred other contacts  _but_ as it turns out, it wasn’t exactly a secret that I had my license suspended. And I might be a decent defense attorney but nothing matters to anyone in this business more than reputation. Which is  _weird_  because I can defend the dregs of society and sleep with a partner’s wife and it’s all copasetic. But become a community college screwup? That’s ball game.” 

  
Annie just watches him.

  
“So, I actually have no idea what I’m going to do.”

  
She sighs and scoots down to rest her head on his shoulder.

  
“That’s okay you know. Something like forty-five percent of college graduates don’t have a long term plan.”

  
Jeff laughs dryly. “Annie, I’m thirty-eight years old. I’m not most college students.”

  
She doesn’t say anything and he turns his head toward her, his lips brushing against the top of her head as he inhales the scent of her shampoo.

  
A few moments later he murmurs against her hair, “The Dean offered me a job.”

  
“Hmm?” Annie’s eyes flutter open.

  
“Adjunct teacher in the Political Science Department.”

  
“Greendale has a Political Science Department?”

  
“Exactly.” 

  
She suddenly gasps and sits up. “You considered it.”

  
“What? No.”

  
“You did. You considered it. And you’re still considering it.”

  
“Do you not know me at all? I hate Greendale. I hate everything it represents. Why, why would I ever consider staying?”

  
She just continues to smile, “Because it’s perfect. You can teach part time, maybe start to build up your own practice on the side.”

  
From the look of incredulity on his face - furrowed brow, but slightly upturned lips -  Annie can tell that this is  _exactly_ what he considered.

  
“Jeff!” She’s practically bouncing on her knees. “You should do it.”

  
“Annie.” He’s trying to look exasperated but he’s smiling too much to pull it off. He gestures towards the television with the remote control, uses the other hand to tug her arm and pull her back. “Watch the movie. It’s getting to the good part. Emilio Estevez is about the save the planet.”

  
She complies and leans back, her shoulder pressed against his, but every few moments he can feel her looking sideways at him through her eyelashes.

  
“Stop.”

  
“Sorry Professor Winger,” she sing-songs.

  
 

~*~*~*~

 

_Summer, 2012_

The summer rambled on, hot lazy days of nothingness, stretching into each other end over end until it was all just this blur of sleeping in late and sitting by the pool all day and drinking with Abed, Troy and Pierce late into the night.

  
In the first few weeks of renewed Bachelordom Jeff claimed he was celebrating by going out to one of the local bars every night and it was simple - he sat down at the bar, assessed the situation, made eye contact and moments later he was buying her a drink and she was giggling that her name was Theresa (Jenny, Melissa, Veronica, etc.) and she was a preschool teacher (yoga instructor, dental hygienist, waitress, etc.) and thirty minutes after that he had her pressed up against her car in the parking lot and her hands were pulling on his belt loops and tugging him closer.

  
It was uncomplicated and easy to get lost in but he wasn’t enjoying it as much as he used to – it was almost boring actually - and he maybe kind of liked it when these nights were interrupted by invitations from Abed to come watch movies or texts from Annie telling him that his favorite episode of Law and Order was on.

  
(And this was when he realized he was officially sixty-five years old, because he left the bar to go home and watch something he had seen a million times already while arguing with Annie via text over whether Law and Order SVU was better than the original or not).

  
Three weeks into the summer he called Britta and they arranged to meet for coffee. He was almost afraid that they would spend a half an hour in stilted conversation, avoiding each other’s eyes. But he got there and saw her blonde curls through the window and he couldn’t help but smile as he slid into the seat across from her and wondered aloud how anyone not in the T-Birds could wear a leather jacket in the middle of the summer.

  
She kicked him under the table as he started reciting the lyrics to “Greased Lightning” but she was smiling too.

  
At the end of the summer Pierce threw himself a birthday party. It was his 69th birthday and it was the first time he ever told anyone his actual age but he seemed really proud of this one and sent out invitations that said, “Come to My 69ing Party.” He claimed this was a typo but no one believed him.

  
Despite this, it actually ended up being a pretty classy affair up at his lake house, with catered food and a band and a dance floor under a large white tent. All their friends from Greendale showed up, along with a few old acquaintances and some scattered stepchildren that were probably only there to leech money but Pierce didn’t seem to mind.

  
Annie, who had been busy all summer working at the paper, even managed to make the trip. She arrived without David, who at the last minute decided to stay home and study for the LSAT.

  
Dusk was starting to fall as Jeff stood on the outskirts of the tent watching Troy spin Britta around the dance floor. She was laughing as she twirled under his arm and then as he dipped her low to the ground.

  
The music changed then and eased into a slower rendition of  _Young at Heart_. Out of the corner of his eye Jeff saw Pierce walk purposefully up to one of the tables and offer his hand to Shirley. She looked up at him with a raised eyebrow but reluctantly got up followed him onto the dance floor. At first his hand landed dangerously low on her back but she smacked his arm and warned him sharply and the hand moved up to a safer spot on her waist.

  
Jeff continued watching for another moment before grabbing another beer and wandering away from the tent in the direction of the lake. The sun had almost completely disappeared behind the mountains and the wisps of clouds in the sky were illuminated in vibrant shades of orange and pinks and reds that reflected against the smooth surface of the lake.

  
His footsteps made dull thuds along the dock, water lapping gently against the side as it swayed across the water with his movement. Annie was sitting at the end, her legs dangling over the edge, toes skimming the surface of the water. Jeff sat down cross-legged next to her and looked out over the lake.

  
“Not a bad view.”

  
“Hmm.” She hummed pleasantly.

  
He took a swig of beer and offered it to her with a half smile. She looked over at him, biting her lip, then finally accepted it with a nod.

  
“What are you doing out here? I think people were hoping you were going to treat us to another Charleston.”

  
Annie’s cheeks flowered with pink as she swallowed and handed the beer back. “I think it was a one time performance.”

  
“Where’d you learn to do that?”

  
“My mom made me take a bunch of dance classes in high school.”

  
“Where do you think  _Abed_  learned?”

  
“Probably from a movie,” she sighed.

  
He laughed. “I wouldn’t doubt that.”

  
The sun dipped completely out of view and the sky began to turn a deepening shade of purple. The soft strains of laughter and music from the party wafted towards them and Annie closed her eyes and swayed back and forth as the band began playing Moonlight Serenade.

  
“It feels like we could be characters in The Great Gatsby,” she said softly.

  
Jeff watched her for a moment, then looked down at the rippling surface of the water and took another pull from the beer.

  
“Just with a better ending,” she added with a frown.

  
He huffed out a laugh, “Here’s hoping.”

  
Annie smiled and they both fell quiet, looking out over the dark expanse of lake as the band played on and the first stars began to appear high in the night sky.

 

~*~*~*~

 

He’s pulled groggily from his sleep by the flickering glow of the television screen and it takes a moment to remember that he’s not at home and that it’s Annie warm against his side, her hands tucked under her chin, her nosed pressed into his shirt at his ribcage.

  
Jeff blindly reaches for the remote control and flicks the television off, his movement jerking her awake. The room is dark now and he can only just barely make out the way she blinks at him through bleary eyes.

  
“Jeff?

  
His hand comes to rest at the back of her head, smoothing over her hair. “You okay?” He asks, his voice thick with sleep.

  
“Mm. Cold.” Her eyes close again and she pulls tighter against him for warmth.

  
“Here.” He reaches back and starts to sit up and together they maneuver under the sheets, Annie’s eyes closed in some hazy state of half consciousness. He curls his arm back around her and pulls her up closer so that her head is pillowed on his chest as he tucks the blankets around them.

  
Annie mutters something incomprehensible but Jeff barely hears it as they both drift back to sleep.

  
When he wakes up again hours later the faintest morning light is glowing through the space in the heavy hotel curtains. The room is warmer now and the sheets have been kicked back down around their legs. He inhales deeply.

  
Annie’s still curled up against him and from this angle he can’t see her eyes, just the way her eyelashes flutter against her cheeks as she blinks, so he knows she’s awake.

  
His heart’s starting to race and she has to know, can probably feel it pounding out a rhythm against her and in a minute she’s going to pull away and get up and leave. But she doesn’t and her index finger starts to trail in aimless circles over his chest.

  
Maybe it’s her heart racing too.

  
He wants to know what she’s thinking, needs to talk to her and hear her voice. His arm is curling tighter around her and she finally tilts her head to look up at him. Her eyes are a darker blue and she just keeps his gaze and she’s pressed all the way against him so that he can feel her rib cage against his as they breath together, tangled up together.

  
“Annie,” he rasps out and her eyes flicker down toward his lips.

  
Maybe it will be like before. Maybe she’ll taste the same and her lips will part immediately, inviting him in. Maybe that will be enough to make her gasp. Or just  _enough_.

  
She’s leaning in.

  
And the phone rings.

  
They both freeze until it rings again and then she’s rolling away.

  
Jeff reaches over and grabs it. “Hello?”

  
“This is your morning wake up-“

  
“Yeah thanks,” he replies monotonously and hangs up, staring at the ceiling.

  
Annie’s doing the same on the other side of the bed, but she’s still resting on his arm, at the palm of his hand. As they continue to lay there, his fingers start pressing against her neck, into her hairline, scratching lightly and her eyes close. She’s got her lower lip between her teeth and Jeff’s about to roll closer when she sits up suddenly.

  
“I should go.”

  
“Oh. Yeah. Okay.” Jeff swings his legs over the side of the bed and sits up, watches as she gathers her things.

  
Her back is to him like she’s afraid to face him and she has to take a deep steadying breath before turning around.

  
“I’m graduating today.”

  
He laughs, “Yes. You are.”

  
Annie opens her mouth to say something else but then seems to changes her mind. She frowns.  

  
Jeff presses the heels of his hands against his eyes. “I’ll see you later?”

  
“…Yeah.”

  
And then she’s gone.


	4. Chapter 4

_Part IV_

_like it’s only you and me_

_~*~*~*~*_

Jeff is getting dressed when there’s a knock on his door and it’s not just a simple  _knock three times_  knock, it’s an incessant, continual knocking that’s almost banging so he knows when he opens it that Britta’s going to be on the other side.

  
“What do you want?” 

  
She sweeps in past him, takes in the unmade bed with a raised eyebrow, drops her purse on the table and turns toward him with her hands on her hips.

  
“Just making sure you’re alive. We can’t be late for Annie’s graduation.”

  
“I’m a grown man Britta,” he says, walking back into the bathroom.

  
“Well that’s debatable.”

  
“So,” she calls out to him a few minutes later, “How late did you and Annie stay down at the bar?”

  
There’s a crash and Britta imagines a cascade of hair products falling to the ground. She smiles. 

  
“Uh. Not long.”

  
“You didn’t let her drive home did you?”

  
There’s a pause. Then, “no.”

  
“Hmmm.” Britta looks toward the bed. “Did she sleep here?”

  
Another pause. “Yes.” He walks out of the bathroom and gives her a hard stare. “But you knew that already so why are you asking questions?”

  
She shrugs. “Abed saw Annie walking out of the elevator this morning, in a shirt that didn’t belong to her. I was just wondering if you were going to fess up to it.”

  
“Nothing happened.” He sits at the edge of the bed to put on his shoes.

  
Britta rolls her eyes, “You’re an idiot, you know that right?”

  
Jeff throws his hands up in the air, “I told you nothing happened. Get off your –

  
“Maybe that’s the problem,” she interrupts.

  
He stops, looking taken aback for a moment. “Wait. What?”

  
She purses her lips, then moves to sit down next to him. “Jeff. Do you know why we broke up?” 

  
The look on his face it so comical that it almost makes her laugh but she bites it back as he shakes his head in confusion and says slowly, “Well. You’re kind of a pain in the ass.”

  
“Cute. But no. We broke up because you’re immature.”

  
He stares at her, “I’d like to go back to the,  _you’re a pain in the ass_  thing.”

  
“It’s true. You’re immature. But. So am I. And two immature people does not a mature couple make. In twenty years if we were still together we’d still be doing the same stupid crap.”

  
“Okaayyy. Where are you going with this? What does this have to do with-” He stops himself and leaves Annie’s name hanging silent in the air between them.

  
“I’m just saying.” She shrugs and then stands up and grabs her purse. “Anyway, we’re meeting downstairs in 20 minutes.”

  
Jeff is squinting at some unseen point in front of him and she pats his shoulder gently, “You’ll figure it out.”

  
He finally looks up and smiles, “You’re not like a lot of girls, are you Britta?”

  
She laughs, “Uhh. I  _really_  hope not.” And then she winks at him and leaves.

  
Jeff stares at the closed door.

  
“Four years,” he mutters, “It was only supposed to be four years.”

  
And it’s suddenly clear that things are never really going to go back to the way they were before Greendale and before this study group turned group of friends and honestly, he’s pretty sure he doesn’t even mind anymore.

 

~*~*~*~

 

_October 13, 2012_

 

Sometime in the fall of her senior year Annie started having a recurring dream about a kitchen table.

  
Sometimes it was round; sometimes it was square or rectangular. Sometimes it was covered in a spread of food and silverware and wine glasses. Sometimes it was just empty.

  
There were voices and blurred faces of people walking around, talking and laughing but only one person ever sat down and joined her at the table. She couldn’t see his face, just the form of this person, and in the dream she knew him and wanted him there.

  
Sometimes he was across from her, sometimes he was next to her and sometimes everyone else disappeared and it was just the two of them. 

  
But she could never, ever see his face.

  
On this particular day she woke up from the dream, the same way she usually did, feeling groggy and confused. Something about it gnawed at her stomach and it didn’t make sense because it was just this silly, stupid, nothing dream about a kitchen table.

  
Annie pried her eyes open and groaned a little, feeling hungover even though she hadn’t been out drinking the night before. She tried to chalk it up to senior year related stress or the fact that she hadn’t been eating a lot of fruit lately.

  
David was on the other side of the bed, his face buried in his pillow. She watched him through squinted eyes for a few minutes until he started stirring.

  
He stretched his arms out over his head and smiled at her. “Morning.”

  
“Hi.” 

  
He blinked a couple times, then rolled over and got out of bed.

  
It was a Saturday and she didn’t want to move, or do anything except stay there with her cheek pressed against the pillow. She listened to David moving around in the bathroom brushing his teeth, and couldn’t help but scowl. It was this little dumb thing but she hated brushing her teeth before breakfast – it made everything taste weird – and sometimes when he did it made her want to scream a little.

  
She buried her head in the pillow, determined not to be like that. Picking stupid fights over stupid things that didn’t matter. But it was that dream - continuing to eat away at her like a persistent fly buzzing around her head.

  
David walked out of the bathroom and went around to her side of the bed, “You want breakfast?” He leaned down and kissed her, closed mouth, but she could still taste the lingering mint of his toothpaste against her lips. She nodded and smiled as he ran his hand down her arm.

  
Annie waited and listened for the sound of him moving around in the kitchen before she stretched out long, diagonally across the bed, spreading her arms out and trying to fill as much space as possible. She stayed like that for a long time, thinking about tables, before finally getting up and stumbling out toward the kitchen to help David with breakfast.

 

~*~*~*~

 

Annie pulls into the school parking lot feeling strangely calm. This is her Graduation Day. This is the day she’s worked towards for so long and in a few hours she’s going to be walking across the stage to accept her diploma but it just doesn’t even seem that important anymore.

  
There was a day in the distant past, before Greendale, before the pills (and maybe a little bit, the reason _for_  the pills) when all she could think of was getting to this point. Getting the Ivy League degree. And then moving onto the next thing. A Masters degree. A PhD. A six-figure salary. Everything was a step to something else.

  
But now, in this strange weird place of  _after it all fell apart,_ those things just don’t matter. Maybe one day she’ll get that six-figure salary and the house to match and the perfect husband. But right now? She just wants to sink into this moment and enjoy it for a little while.

  
Her mind tumbles over the memories of last night. Being with her friends. Laughing. Talking. Sitting around a table with these people who have become so familiar over the years. She can’t imagine life without Abed’s disturbingly keen observations, and Troy’s way of making even the most illogical things make sense. And Britta’s jaded hipster, secretly lined with frilly hearts, view on life. And Pierce’s daftness and Shirley’s sweetness and Jeff’s….

  
She tries for a moment to push him out, looks at this big picture of her life and tries to cut out the part wherein he exists but she can’t do it because somewhere in the timeline, he snuck in everywhere, filtered in through all the little cracks and he’s the first person she thinks of to call when she’s excited or worried or bored and she just wants to share these things with him.

  
Her breath hitches as she remembers waking up at the hotel and being wrapped up so entirely in him.

  
“Damn.” She rests her head on the steering wheel and wills herself to breathe.

  
There’s a knock at the window and her head shoots up, heart racing. It’s Abed. She stares at him for a second and he blinks back at her before she reaches over to roll down the window.

  
“Hi.”

  
“Hey.”

  
“It looked like you were having a moment of critical introspection and character development so I wasn’t going to interrupt. But then I remembered. You’re my friend. So I thought maybe you could use one of those.”

  
Annie ducks her head and smiles, “Hold on.”

  
She rolls the window back up and then grabs her cap and gown off the passenger seat.

  
Abed’s standing near the trunk of the car with his hands in his pockets. He tilts his head to the side, “I feel like something significant has happened.”

  
She opens her mouth, then shuts it again and sighs, “Is everyone else here?”

  
“They’re taking a tour of the campus. We wanted to get here early so that we could get good seats.”

  
It still overwhelms her sometimes, that she has these people who care so much.

  
“It’s probably going to be pretty boring. Lots of speeches and names being called. I’m sure it won’t live up to your graduation ceremony. We don’t have Harry Potter robes.”

  
She’s teasing him but it’s Abed so he considers this seriously. “It depends on what you’re hoping to take out of the experience. Our production quality was inadequate. But it did have heart.”

  
Annie smiles, “Heart is good.”

  
He’s examining her closely, “Your character arc has been especially similar to Jeff’s.  

  
Annie starts and looks up at him. His expression is unreadable but she narrows her eyes and offers him a half smile.

  
“It’s surprising,” he continues, “Because that’s not the way it was outlined from the beginning. But then again, a lot of things have gone off script.” 

  
She tilts her head, “And maybe learning that is  _your_  character arc.”

  
He considers this, then smiles brightly. “Maybe.”

  
“You know Abed.” She loops her arm through his, “Chandler and Phoebe should have had more storylines together.”

  
He nods, “They  _were_  the two most inherently humorous characters.”

  
“Agreed.”

~*~*~*~

 

_January 17, 2013_

 

“I kissed Jeff.”

  
It seemed like a good idea, this going to visit Annie over winter break. David was out of town and they made a girls weekend of it, going shopping and eating junk food and watching sappy movies that Britta claimed to hate (but Annie looked over at one point and Britta’s eyes were glistening and she had always been full of crap about things like this so it wasn’t surprising).

  
On Saturday night, after consuming an entire pizza, they decided to start doing shots and trading secrets about first kisses and crushes and Britta decided that she liked this new slightly less repressed version of Annie who still blushed and wouldn’t give details but admitted to liking sex and finally understanding what the “fuss was all about.”

  
It was somewhere around the third or fourth shot when the “I kissed Jeff” slipped out.

  
Britta froze, her shot glass halfway to her lips. She set it back down slowly, her brain trying to muddle through the haze of alcohol, trying to make sense of Annie’s words.

  
“You  _kissed_  Jeff,” she said slowly.

  
Annie looked pained, her eyes wide.

  
“Okay.” Britta looked at the half empty bottle of Jose Cuervo. The drinking was a bad idea. Drinking with  _Annie_  was a bad idea.

  
“When?”

  
“Um.” Annie jumped up and started pacing back and forth, wringing her hands. “We were both confused that night and he was…. And I had just broken up with Vaughn…. And he was there and we… I really never meant to hurt you.”

  
“Annie.” Britta held up her hand and closed her eyes. The pacing was making her stomach churn. “Annie, you broke up with Vaughn like three years ago.”

  
“Two and a half.”

  
“You kissed Jeff  _two and a half years ago_  and just now you’ve decided to,” Britta opened her eyes, “Get all insane about it? Like I care what happened that long ago?”

  
“It was at the Tranny Dance,” Annie said quickly and then practically threw herself back to the ground, “I’m so sorry.”

  
“The…” Britta shook her head and then her eyes went wide, “After I…?”

  
Annie nodded and Britta leaned back against the couch. “Oh.”

  
“Oh, you hate me now. I knew it. I knew this would happen.”

  
“No.” Britta tilted her head a little. This didn’t matter. It was a long time ago. She picked up the discarded shot and downed it quickly, wiped the back of her hand across her mouth. “I had sex with him. During paintball.”

  
Annie was following suit and pouring another shot. Her hands shook slightly and she ended up sloshing tequila all over the carpet. This barely seemed to register though as she raised the glass and swallowed it quickly, shivering a little. “I know. Shirley told me.”

  
“On the study table.”

  
“I know. Shirley told me.”

  
Both women were quiet. Annie picked nervously at a spot on the carpet.

  
“Annie?”

  
“Yeah?”

  
“Did anything else ever…?”

  
Annie shook her head. “No!” Then she paused. “Well, there was this other time. Before I left for school. But it was just… it was nothing.”

  
Britta closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the couch. This was suddenly a lot to take in. She searched through the mental card catalogue of memories in her head for anything labeled Annie or Jeff, Annie  _and_  Jeff and there were  _a lot_ of those _…_ and this was suddenly making a strange amount of sense.

  
“When I was twenty-one I dated this guy for awhile who was forty-two. His name was Grant. We met at a Greenpeace rally in… Boston? Maybe it was Detroit.”

  
“Oh. Okay?” Annie looked perplexed.

  
Britta wasn’t entirely sure why she was letting Annie into this little piece of her history. It had something to do with Jeff. And Jeff kissing Annie (Eighteen-year old Annie, fresh out of high school  _Annie_ , who actually  _wasn’t_ eighteen years old anymore and had her own apartment and liked sex and wasn’t as shrill and…)

  
Is that what Jeff wanted? Or needed? Or.

  
Britta lifted her head up and  _fuck_ , the room started swimming around her.

  
“Did you ever tell David about any of this?”

  
“What?” Annie seemed genuinely confused at this. “Why would I? It was two years ago.” She searched Britta’s face and suddenly looked panicked. “Should I tell him? Does he need to know? Do you think he’ll be mad?” 

  
Okay, so maybe Annie could still be as shrill as she used to be.

  
“Annie. Annie.” Britta waved her hand in the air and Annie fell silent. 

  
Two and a half years ago.  _Two and a half years ago_. This really, really didn’t matter.

  
She leaned forward and grabbed Annie’s hand. “Annie, I  _forgive_  you.”

  
Annie beamed back and suddenly seemed to forget any worries about telling David. “Britta! Thank you!”

  
“And fuck Jeff Winger.”

  
Annie flushed but nodded in approval and held up her shot glass in cheers.

  
“Oh!” Britta gasped, her eyes lighting up with excitement. “You know what we should do? We should call him and tell him that.”

  
“Oooh!”

  
They did.

  
Jeff didn’t answer but the next morning he found a fifteen minute voicemail wherein “Fuck you Jeff Winger” turned into a discussion about that “awful professor Slater” he used to date and then Britta imitating Jeff’s cowboy accent which lead into a five minute conversation on how Abed actually made a pretty sexy Batman (a conversation that Britta seemed entirely too giggly about) and then they were suddenly talking about their favorite childhood cartoons until they began warbling out the theme songs to iconic television shows. The message cut off just as Annie started singing,  _“I’ll be there for you, when the rain starts to pour_ ” and Britta cut in with, “You know what we should do? Call Jeff.”

  
Jeff saved the message just in case.

 

~*~*~*~

 

In Jeff’s estimation, the graduation ceremony lasts about fifteen hours. It’s an endless run of boring speeches and overblown rhetoric about reaching for the stars and standing out in a crowd and whatthehellever, followed by the long monotonous roll call of names.

  
He starts to nod off at one point but Britta elbows him and gives him a pointed look and he somehow manages to remain conscious enough to hear “Annie Edison, Magna Cum Laude” and watch as she practically skips her way across the stage.

  
They all scream and cheer and then it’s just over and Annie’s back in her seat as the endless roll call continues.  

  
“Can we leave now?” he mutters to Britta. She glares at him but five minutes later he looks back over and she’s half asleep with her head on Troy’s shoulder. Hypocrite.

  
Annie’s parents are there but sitting further down the bleachers and it’s strange because after four years this is still the first time they’ve all met.

  
He’s not sure what he expected from her parents. Maybe that her dad would be this imposing figure in a business suit who casts distain on his daughter’s ragtag group of friends. Or that her mom would look like one of those political wives in a two-piece suit complete with heels and pearls and perfectly coifed hair.

  
But Annie’s parents, well, look like Annie. Her dad is wearing khaki pants and a polo shirt and her mom has long dark hair and Annie’s exact eyes, except with more creases around the corners and maybe this is what Annie will look like in thirty years.

  
Something about this, imagining Annie in thirty years – what’s she’ll look like, what she’ll be doing, if she’ll be attending  _her own_ daughter’s graduation – makes Jeff’s heart rate speed up.

  
After the ceremony (after they all wake up again and blink dazedly into the sunlight and Britta looks horrified to find that she’s drooled on Troy’s shirt) he finds himself standing next to Mr. Edison as they wait for Annie.

  
“Oh, call me Todd.”

  
Jeff nods and slides his hands into his pockets, “You must be proud of her.”

  
“Of course.” Todd frowns and Jeff recognizes the expression from Annie when she’s thinking about something that’s bothering her, when she’s feeling uncomfortable.

  
“Do you have kids Jeff?”

  
Jeff snorts out a laughing, “No,” then coughs and sputters when he realizes this is a serious question. “Um. No.”

  
Todd nods, “You can’t really understand until… You know, you think you know what’s best but sometimes…” he falls silent and Jeff shifts uncomfortably.

  
Annie’s talked enough about high school that Jeff knows the role her parents played in what happened and that the relationship there has never truly been mended. It’s easy to cast them as the villains for wrapping their daughter up in such a precarious web of insecurity and doubt for so long. But now that he’s standing here, Jeff can’t help but feel a little sorry for them.

  
He clears his throat, “Well she’s-”

  
She’s what? She’s in a good place and she survived  _Little Annie Adderall_  and figured out her own way and she did it surrounded by the first people in her life to truly accept who she  _already_  was.

  
“Your daughter’s pretty awesome.”

  
Todd turns and looks at him sharply but then they hear Annie’s voice and she’s running towards them, her hand on her mortarboard so that it doesn’t come flying off. She reaches Shirley first and they throw their arms around each other and start jumping up and down until Troy and Britta join them and it’s this four-person hug of laughter and maybe a little tears and no one minds when Pierce throws his arms around all of them and rests his head on top of Britta’s. 

  
Abed stands to the side and regards them with a critical eye and Jeff just watches it all with a smile until Annie finally untangles herself and turns toward where he is standing next to her parents. She starts toward him but then seems to change her mind and goes to lean into a side hug with her dad. Todd doesn’t say anything, just nods and presses a kiss to the side of her head as her mom pats her cheek and smiles fondly.

  
“We’re very proud of you honey.”

  
When she does reach Jeff they both kind of laugh as they step into a hug (and it almost feels like it did three and a half years ago in the study room again) but he wraps his arms around her, bending down so that his mouth is next to her ear. “Congratulations,” he whispers against her and then can’t help the way his lips ghost over her cheek as he pulls away.

  
Annie ducks her head so he can’t see her eyes but he knows what he’d see and the certainty with which he knows this almost knocks him off his feet.

  
And suddenly, it just makes sense.

 

~*~*~*~

 

_March 20, 2013_

It happened two months before graduation and it happened pretty much exactly the way she’d always pictured it.

  
New dress, fancy restaurant, roses, a violin. He held her hand and told her he loved her, told her she was beautiful and that she was the most amazing woman he’d ever known and then he was getting down on one knee and there was a ring and it caught the light just right so that it seemed to sparkle from within. Her breath hitched and there were tears in her eyes.

  
And suddenly she had to idea what to say.

  
She looked at the ring and looked at him and her mouth opened but nothing came out and she was feeling a little dumbfounded and stupid while he gazed up at her, everyone in the restaurant watching them eagerly.

  
“Um.”

  
It was like a scene in a movie and everyone leaned forward as she began to speak.

_  
Yes. Yes. The word you’re looking for is yes._

  
“I have to pee.”

  
“What?”

  
“I have to…” And then she grabbed her purse and fled toward the bathroom.

  
There were a couple women already in there that threw her startled looks as she came banging in though the door and it was no wonder she thought, as she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Her face was radiating out a look of utter frenzy.

  
She locked herself in the corner stall and started digging through her purse, realizing that she still had the ring box in her hand.

  
“Fuck.”

  
Her own voice startled her and she clasped her hand over her mouth. Luckily, the other women had walked about already and no one heard this completely out of character moment for little Annie Edison.

  
She finally found her phone and stared at it for a second. Shirley. Britta. Her mom. Each of them would tell her different things. Each of them would give different advice in various degrees of truthfulness and she wasn’t really sure what she needed or even wanted to hear in that moment.

  
So she pressed speed dial 5.

  
Each successive ring pulsed under her skin until:

_  
“Jeff Winger. Leave a message.”_

  
At the beep she opened her mouth to say something, then quickly changed her mind and hung up. She pressed the phone to her forehead. “Oh god. Ohgodohgodohgod.”

  
David. She loved David. And it wasn’t like this moment came as a surprise, not like they hadn’t talked about it and already made plans to move in together after graduation when her lease was up. He was going to go to law school while she kept working at the paper and then eventually they would buy a place and have their two children and everything would be perfect and the way they had always planned.

  
All she had to do was say yes.

  
For a moment she allowed herself to imagine the alternative, what it meant for tonight and tomorrow and two weeks down the road. It meant staying in her own place, maybe moving, going somewhere she’d never dreamed about, Europe maybe where she could have a torrid love affair with an artist named Pierre. Or she could stay, paint her living room purple, buy a cat and fall asleep every night by herself.

  
Or maybe - 

_  
Oh._

  
The ring box was clutched tight in her hand as she dropped the phone back into her purse and exited the stall. Her reflection gazed back from the mirror, looking decidedly less frantic. This was not the same Annie from high school, from four years ago, from even ten minutes ago.  

  
She closed her eyes and took one deep breath before pushing through the door to the restaurant and walking back calmly to the table.

 

~*~*~*~

 

When her parents offer to take everyone out to dinner Annie immediately starts trying to come up with excuses.

  
Something about spending an extended amount of time in a room with these two parts of her life makes her feel a little hysterical. But everyone else seems excited by it and her dad is pulling out his cell phone to call ahead at a local Italian restaurant.

  
She tries to focus on other things – she won’t be a fatalist, this isn’t the end of the world – like walking across the stage to accept her diploma, the sound of her friends cheering her name, the warm press of Jeff’s hand lingering on her back a beat longer than necessary after he pulled away from their hug.

  
This last one she sinks into, adds to the expanding corner of memories she’s stored up from the past four years - brief touches, looks...  _kisses_. She keeps them separate from all those other Jeff memories, the ones where he’s just a friend, just the person in her life she can go to with anything, for anything, at any time. These two sets of memories need to be kept apart and she’s maybe afraid of what it means when everything starts melting together. 

  
“Annie.” Shirley tugs on her hand and she shakes herself from wondering and follows her friends to the parking lot.

  
When they get to the restaurant they’re seated at a long rectangular table near the back and Annie starts to relax a bit as she realizes that this melding of worlds hasn’t caused some sort of crack in the space time continuum.

  
There’s a brief moment of panic when Pierce starts talking to her dad but it’s just about Hawthorne Wipes and original startup costs and it doesn’t seem to be anything that Pierce will be able to turn offensive. Her mom is talking with Britta about cats and apparently Britta’s newest cat has hairball issues or something disgusting that Annie tries to stop listening to.

  
“Not too bad right?” Jeff leans over and whispers to her. She smiles.

  
“No. I guess not. Although, I suppose it’s only a matter of time before Pierce says something that makes my mom’s head start spinning around.”

  
“Well, now  _that_  might actually be kind of fun.”

  
She laughs and turns toward him more to say something else when suddenly her mom’s voice breaks through the din.

  
“Oh, David was just such a lovely young man wasn’t he?”

  
Annie stiffens visibly, her hands clenching the seat of her chair at the sides. 

  
Down at the end of the table her mom just continues to smile and shake her head, “We had so hoped that he would be the one for our Annie. But I guess you never know.” Her voice drips with actual pity over this situation – it’s nothing vindictive but this theme of “disappointed parents” has been so ever present in her life that Annie knows it when she hears it.

  
Her dad is nodding in agreement and Pierce just looks confused as everyone else throws troubled glances in Annie’s direction. Something warm settles against her closed fist and she looks down to find Jeff’s hand closing over hers under the table.

  
“You know, this is actually a common theme in movies and television.”

  
Everyone turns to stare at Abed at the other end of the table. He’s watching Annie with a frown, then turns his gaze toward her parents.

  
“At the beginning the main character will be set up with someone that  _appears_ perfect, everything they’ve been looking for but in the end it turns out that they are only a foil for the person that they’re  _supposed_  to be with – someone less than perfect, but perfect for them.”

  
He stops and thinks about, “Sometimes the foil is even discovered to be the actual villain or antagonist of the story. But I don’t think David displayed any villain-like tendencies, did he Annie?”

  
She smiles, in parts gratitude and amusement. “No.” Then she sneaks a peak over to her parents who both look a little befuddled.

  
Her mom leans over to Britta and whispers, “I’m not sure what that young man is talking about.”

  
Britta purses her lips to hold back a smile and coughs before she can say anything “Don’t worry about it.” She looks across the table, “So Pierce, tell us, exactly what kind of award  _is_ a moist towelette eligible for?”

  
Pierce puffs up his chest, and glances around the table proudly, “Well Britta, I’m glad you asked,” and he promptly launches into in the tale of the hotly contested Arapahoe County Moist-Off of 1998.

  
Everyone else suddenly breaks off into their own, unusually loud, conversations and Annie’s parents bear the lost expressions of two people just running to keep up.

  
Annie has to swallow thickly before she can look up again. Jeff is turned toward Shirley as they laugh about some guy they saw at graduation wearing overalls but against the back of Annie’s hand his thumb taps softly a couple times. She fights back this smile that threatens to bloom completely across her face but at the same time her hand is unclenching and she’s turning her palm and sliding her fingers between his. 

  
He coughs suddenly and in the middle of his conversation he turns and catches her gaze, his lips turning up slightly, his eyes – Annie’s not even sure how to describe it but there’s something there that’s deepening, softening and she’s never seen him look at  _anyone_  else like this. Her ears buzz with all the ambient noise of music playing through the speakers and her friends laughing and then there’s just Jeff and his eyes on her and his hand in hers. 

  
All those memories that have been pushed apart and quarantined away suddenly flood together in a wave and she just knows.

  
She’s in love with Jeff Winger.


	5. Chapter 5

_Part V_   
_yes, I am home  
  
~*~*~*~_

_April 18, 2013_

 

It had been three weeks since David’s failed proposal turned teary breakup and Annie had been spending an inordinate amount of time curled up in bed, eating ice cream and watching old movies. There was something so movie-cliché “I just got my heart broken” about it that sometimes she almost thought she was enjoying herself too much.

  
There were still those moments though - when she was making dinner and eating it at an empty kitchen table that she was completely overwhelmed by this new hole in her life.

  
It didn’t help that all of Annie’s university friends had actually been David’s friends first and humiliating him during a marriage proposal in a crowded restaurant hadn’t really endeared her to any of them very much. So this David shaped hole kept growing by increments until her crying into a pint of Ben and Jerry’s “breakup routine” turned into “I really just don’t have anything better to do.”

  
“My mom called again.”

  
“How many times today?”

  
“Twice. Once to tell me she remembered how sweet it was that David sent her Mother’s Day flowers last year.”

  
“Maybe you should stop answering your phone when she calls. That’s how I deal with it.”

  
“I’ve considered it. Maybe I like being tortured by it a little bit.”

  
“Masochist.”

  
Annie rolled her eyes and settled back against the pillows, situating the phone so that it was balanced on top her knee.

  
Jeff’s voice floated out disembodied from the speaker, “Okay, seriously, how does a high school student get into the Hollywood Bowl during off hours like this?”

  
Annie smiled and watched as Lea Thompson and Eric Stoltz argued onscreen. “You’re just jealous you didn’t think of it.”

  
“And who gives diamond earrings to someone they’ve been on  _one_  date with? You’re supposed to hold out until she actually starts demanding crap like that.”

  
She laughed again. “Stop it. You’re ruining this for me.”

  
Jeff fell silent, save for a few derisive snorts every now and then.

  
A few minutes later though Annie suddenly blurted out, “I got a job in Boulder.”

  
There was a beat before Jeff spoke, “What?”

  
“At a newspaper. I’ll pretty much be doing the same thing I’d be doing here but… at least I’ll be at home." 

  
“Home.”

  
“Yeah, Boulder’s only like a half an hour drive from Greendale. I figured I could live there, just commute in every day. Or, well, even if I live in Boulder I… I’ll at least be closer, right?”

  
“Wow. Yeah.”

  
On the other side of the line Jeff stared blankly at the television screen, the laundry he had been folding sitting forgotten in front of him.

  
It had been three weeks since she had called him one morning to tell him about the proposal and subsequent breakup but it was still hard to wrap his mind around the idea that she was just Annie now – and of course she was always been _just Annie_  but for a year and a half he had trained himself to constantly tack on this “with David” to the end of who she was like it was this really important thing to remember.

  
And of course there was going to be a proposal. Part of him had always just half expected to log into Facebook one day to see one of those “Guess what?” status updates followed by a picture of a diamond ring. 

  
But now here she was,  _just Annie_ , talking about coming home.

  
“That’s what you want?”

  
She sighed, “Yes. It’s stupid, I know. I should want to go somewhere like New York and live in the city and drink… what do they drink is the city? Martinis? Whatever. And just be scandalous for awhile. But.”

  
Jeff laughed loudly at this, “I’d like to see that.” 

  
Annie smiled, “Can’t you picture it? Me, traipsing down the streets of New York in six inch heels and a fur coat?”

  
“I love that that’s your idea of scandalous.”

  
“Well there would be lots of sex too.”

  
Jeff coughed and choked out a strangled laugh as Annie flushed furiously and sank back down against her pillow in embarrassment. After a beat though, she felt a weird rush of empowerment.

  
They watched the rest of the movie in silence until the credits started rolling.

  
“Do you think he ever regretted letting go of Amanda Jones?”

  
“Did they ever actually refer to her without using her last name? Who in real life does that?”

  
“Jeff, answer the question.”

  
He sighed, “I don’t know. Probably not. But I don’t think that’s the point.”

  
“Yeah.” 

  
The screen changed as the opening music for the next movie started playing.

_  
When we danced he held me tight  
and when he walked me home that night  
all the stars were shining bright  
and then he kissed me._

  
“You know, I think Abed’s on to something, Britta  _does_  look a little bit like Elizabeth Shue.”

  
Jeff squinted at the television, “Huh. Maybe.”

 

~*~*~*~

 

Jeff stands in the middle of his hotel room, staring blankly at the wall. He’s not sure how long ago it was that he made some lame excuse and left everyone at the bar, not sure how long he’s even been standing here, unsure of what to do with himself. 

  
He’s waiting.

  
Earlier in the restaurant, as Annie folded her hand into his under the table and continued holding onto him until the food came, he had felt some strange electrical shock to his system that hadn’t really gone away in the following hours - as they left the restaurant, said good bye to Annie’s parents, made their way back to the hotel bar – it’s this new constant company and it’s driving him to the kind of distraction that not even scotch and the chatter of five friends can numb.

  
He’s not even sure he wants it to.

  
So now he’s waiting.

  
There’s a quiet knock at the door and he opens it without really even thinking, to find Annie standing there, biting her lip. When she looks up at him through her eyelashes Jeff fingers curl into the palm of his hand and he has to take a deep steadying breath.

  
“Hey."

  
“Hi.”

  
He waves her into the room and she steps in, looking around like she’s never been there before, like she’s expecting something to have changed. Maid service had been there earlier so the bed’s made and her eyes sweep across it before she turns back around to look at him.

  
“Jeff, you’re my best friend.” Her hands twist nervously behind her back.

  
He gives her a half smile, but as she opens her mouth to say more he suddenly moves forward, his hands dropping to her waist to pull her toward him. She makes a noise of surprise as she collides into him but he’s leaning down and kissing her hard, drawing her up so that her feet almost leave the ground.

  
Everything goes sort of foggy and dark for a second but then her hands are sliding up his chest as she starts to kiss him back with an almost frantic urgency. Jeff’s arms wrap completely around her, crushing her to him as she clutches at his shirt collar, his shoulders, the back of his neck, and they both moan as his tongue sweeps into her mouth.

  
She tastes so completely like Annie, with the tangy hint of vodka cranberry, and when his lower lip gets caught between her teeth and she pulls on it gently he groans, one of his hands moving up to tangle in her hair, cup the back of her head and angle her closer.

  
They don’t even realize they’re moving until Jeff’s legs bump up against the bed and he stumbles back against it, pulling her down on top of him. They both laugh as she braces herself, then pushes back up on her knees so that she’s straddling his hips. Jeff sits up with her, his hands settling on her hips. Their foreheads rest together.

  
“Fuck,” he mutters softly. She pulls back to look at him, concern creasing her brow.

  
“No. It’s not…” He smiles, tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, then twirls the soft ends around his finger. “I don’t think I realized how much wanted to do that." 

  
Annie relaxes. She cups the back of his neck, stroking her fingers across the skin there. “Jeff, I was serious before. You’re my best friend.”

  
He nods, “And do you think that  _this_ ,” his eyebrow goes up, “changes that?" 

  
She shakes her head slowly. His hands are smoothing up and down her arms, then around, brushing her hair aside to run fingertips across the bare skin of her back above her dress. Annie’s eyes flutter closed as she shifts against him, leans in to capture his lips again.

  
“Hmm. Jeff. This morning,” she whispers between kisses, “I wanted.”

  
“Me too.” One of his hands slides back down to her thigh, then lower to her knee.

  
“And. At Pierce’s party.” 

  
“I know.”

  
Her lips trail down his jaw line to the spot under his ear and when her teeth nip at the skin there he groans low in his throat. She pulls back with a self-satisfied smirk but the hand at her knee is sliding back up to just under the edge of her dress, fingers pressing into soft skin and she shivers and drops her head back down the crook of his neck. 

  
“Jeff.” She says his name in a whispered sigh and he smiles, reveling in the way her body warms against him.

  
He nudges her head back up and her eyes are closed, lips parted slightly as she breathes, the rise and fall of her ribcage against his. He tugs her closer, pressing a hand against her low back as he moves in to hover his lips just above hers, “I love you,” he breathes against her.

  
Annie doesn’t open her eyes, but he can feel the way her lips curl softly into a smile, the way she hitches herself around him, into him, and it suddenly feels insane that they haven’t been doing this forever. 

  
“I love you,” she whispers back.

 

~*~*~*~

 

_Summer 2012_

 

Annie fumbled along in the dark, brushing her hand along the side of the wall, searching for a light switch. She just knew there would end up being a step somewhere that she’d end up tripping over, falling on her face and waking an entire houseful of people because she needed to be taken to the emergency room with a broken limb of some sort.

  
Pierce’s lake house was enormous (ten bedrooms, eight bathrooms and even a supposed hidden passage that Troy and Abed would spend the next two days trying to find), which was nice when there were fifteen people packed into it, but mildly dangerous when she was trying to stumble around in the dark.

  
She rounded the corner and breathed a sigh of relief that at the end of the hall the kitchen light was on so that she could make her way less blind. At the doorway to the kitchen she stopped short though when she saw that she apparently wasn’t the only one having a sleepless night.

  
“Midnight snack?”

  
Jeff peered out from behind the refrigerator door and smiled, “Cereal. Want some?”

  
“Sure.” She shuffled in as he set a carton of milk on the counter next to a box of Frosted Flakes.

  
She feigned shock. “Jeff, you’re eating  _carbs_  now?”

  
“Summer’s almost over. Don’t have to worry about that bathing suit body as much anymore. I can live dangerously.” He patted his stomach to make his point.

  
Annie rolled her eyes and hopped up onto the counter as he handed her a bowl and a spoon.

  
“Couldn’t sleep?”

  
She nodded, “Britta snores.”

  
“Ahh. Yes. That she does. Like a chainsaw if I remember correctly.” 

  
“How did you put up with that?”

  
“Well, obviously that’s why we broke up.”

  
Annie smiled at him, held out her bowl as he poured in a generous helping of cereal and milk.

  
She had been spending most of the summer trying to log overtime at the paper so it was actually the first time she had seen him since his midnight visit back in May. It was almost strange to just walk into a kitchen and find him there – but mostly because there was such a normalcy to it.

  
“So, this party tomorrow. Should I be worried?” 

  
Jeff nodded. “You saw the invitation.”

  
She grimaced. “Don’t remind me.”

  
He laughed. “Actually, it sounds like it might be, dare I say, classy?”

  
Annie swallowed a bite of cereal and gasped in exaggerated shock, “Pierce?”

  
Jeff nodded, his eyes wide and then they fell silent as they ate, the kitchen echoing with the sounds of their spoons scraping the bottoms of the plastic bowls.  

  
“Do you think Pierce is happy?” Annie asked suddenly.

  
Jeff chewed thoughtfully and then shrugged, “I don’t know. Cluelessly happy maybe.”

  
“I mean, when he’s at home alone at night, do you think….?”

  
He leaned back against the counter next to her, “Honestly, I prefer to not spend my time thinking about Pierce being home alone.”

  
She frowned at him.

  
“I’m serious Annie. If I’m sitting around thinking about  _Pierce_  being alone, doesn’t that make me just as pathetic?” He looked down and scuffed his toe against the tiled floor.

  
 Annie set down her bowl on the counter and leaned forward a little, “Jeff, are  _you_  happy?”

  
Jeff looked up at the tone in her voice, surprised to see something like fear flash in her eyes.

  
“Annie, I’m not… Yes, I’m happy. I am.” He tilted his head toward her in assurance. “I’m not going to go jump off a bridge or something. Really. I wouldn’t want to deprive the world of my brand of awesome.”

  
She scoffs but looks away to hide the blush that is slowly spreading up her cheeks. Maybe she  _had_  been worried about him, somehow afraid that she was the only one that knew how the breakup really affected him and that he would keep it all bottled up until it was this huge ugly thing that never went away.

  
It made her feel responsible enough for his emotional well-being that she had started texting him randomly with stupid little things to try to make him laugh in a “hey buddy I’m here for you” kind of way. But then he would inevitably come back with something that would make  _her_  laugh or smile. And suddenly, “here’s a joke I thought you might enjoy” became “I’m bored at the DMV, what are you doing?” and fifteen-minute back and forth conversations.

  
“Maybe I just don’t want to think about the fact that one day I’ll be him,” Jeff was saying.

  
Annie sighed, “Jeff, you will never be Pierce.”

  
He turned to face her and his hand landed on her knee.

  
“You sure about that?”

  
She nodded. “Well, for one thing, you’ve never been married.” 

  
“Hmm.”

  
She could feel the warmth of his fingers through the soft material of her pajama pants and her eyes flickered up to his.

  
Jeff watched her for a moment and she didn’t think that she was imagining the fact that he was leaning in closer. There was this magnetic pull in his eyes or lips or just the fact that this was Jeff and it was only at the last moment that she dipped her head down so that his lips only came in contact with her forehead.

  
“I should-” She rested her hand on his shoulder and she meant to push him away but then her fingers were curling into the material of the shirt there and holding on.

  
“Yeah,” he whispered, his lips still warm on her skin, at her hairline, lips moving in tiny almost imperceptible kisses that made her breath hitch.

  
Suddenly she just wanted to sob, curl up against him and cry her eyes out and she didn’t even know why.

  
“Bed. I should go to bed,” she finally said and he was stepping away, looking up at the ceiling, out the window, anywhere but at her.

  
Annie slid off the counter and walked toward the doorway feeling dazed.

  
“Hey Annie.”

  
She froze for a moment, her eyes squeezed shut, before turning to find him looking at her guiltily, one hand braced on the counter. He offered her a little half-smile which she returned with a nod.

  
“I’ll see you in the morning.”

  
“Yeah.”

  
She shuffled back toward her bedroom, feeling her way along the wall for guidance.

 

~*~*~*~

 

“Greendale’s not going to know what to do when the entire female population takes a sudden interest in Poly Sci.”

  
Jeff laughs and rolls to face her where she’s lying on her stomach, head pillowed on her arms. Sunlight pours in through the open window she had gotten up and pulled the curtains away from earlier.

  
“Jealous?” He reaches over and scoops her hair into a makeshift ponytail in his hand, then lets it cascade over to one side. His thumb runs along the shape of her shoulder blade before he leans down to kiss over the same spot.

  
“No. I’m sure Dean Pelton will be there to make sure no one does anything untoward. He’ll probably even audit your class. Just to make sure none of the girls get too unruly.”

  
“Hmm.” His hand continues skimming down the curve of her back at her spine.

  
Annie inhales deeply and sinks further into the mattress. She unfolds one of her arms and reaches her hand up to curl her fingers against his cheek. He kisses her palm and scoots in closer.

  
“What time is its?” she murmurs.

  
As if to answer, there is a sudden knocking at the door. A sudden, incessant, continual,  _knock, knock, knock_ , knocking. Annie shoots up and wraps the sheet around herself as Jeff rolls off the other side of the bed and grabs his boxers off the ground. 

  
“Crap,” he mutters, stumbling and catching himself on the table.

  
Annie scrambles off the bed, looks at him with wide eyes and then turns and flees into the bathroom without a sound, grabbing her dress off the ground on the way.

  
“Annie,” he hisses after her, yanking his shirt over his head. “Shit.”

  
He pauses to run a hand through his hair before throwing the lock and opening the door to reveal Britta, her face turned up in a scowl.

  
Jeff leans into the door frame, trying to look casual, “What’s up?”

  
“ _What’s up?_  Do you have any idea what time it is?”

  
“Um.” He doesn’t actually.

  
“It’s 11:30. We have to checkout by 12:00.”

  
“Right. Yeah. I’m… definitely on that.”

  
Britta narrows her eyes and peers around him, takes in the comforter and pillows scattered around the floor. Her scowl suddenly changes to something more smug.

  
“So where  _did_  you go last night? We were worried. You just disappeared.”

  
“Oh, you know, I wasn’t feeling good. Must have been something I ate. Came back here and went to sleep.”

  
“Huh. And Annie?”

  
He freezes, his eyes wide. “What?”

  
“She disappeared too. Kind of around the same time you did actually.”

  
Jeff purses his lips and shakes his head, “Weird.”

  
“Uh-huh.” Britta doesn’t move but she looks around him again toward the bathroom door. The second a smirk starts to spread across her features, Jeff knows what’s about to happen. He grimaces.

  
“Hey Annie?” she calls.

  
There’s no answer but Britta continues to smile.

  
“Annie, we’re going to be leaving soon. It would be nice if we could say goodbye.”

  
There’s another pause. Then quietly from behind the door, “Okay.”

  
Britta looks back at Jeff. The smirk slips a little and it’s replaced briefly by something more wistful. He tilts his head at her and shrugs. She nods in return and then turns down the hallway.

  
After he shuts the door behind her Jeff lets out a deep breath of air.

  
The bathroom door cracks open and Annie peers out, still wrapped in the sheet. 

  
“How did she know?”

  
“I’m not  _completely_  sure but I think she may have figured it out before we did.”

  
Annie’s forehead creases in worry.

  
“Hey, don’t worry about it.”

  
“I don’t want her to-”

  
“Really. Don’t.” He moves into the doorway next to her and runs his hand down her arm, takes in the sheet she’s tugged around her body, the tousled hair and smudged eye makeup. “I should probably shower before I leave.”

  
“Oh, okay, I’ll-” She moves to skirt around him but he grabs her by the waist and pushes her further into the bathroom.

  
“Jeff!” But she’s laughing as he kicks the door closed behind him.

~*~*~*~

_  
August 27 th 2011 _   
  
  


Jeff had just made eye contact with the gorgeous blonde across the bar when his phone vibrated in his pocket. He nodded at her and flashed the patented Jeff Winger smile as he discretely pulled the phone from his pocket. The text was from Annie.

_  
“hey what are you doing?”_

  
He narrowed his eyes and quickly typed a response.

_  
“nothing why?”_

_  
“can you meet me for coffee?”_

  
He stared at the phone for a second, a little confused, a little concerned because she didn’t normally text him at such a late hour to just randomly ask to meet up, and usually it was just reminders about events she was planning and admonitions that he needed to study more.

  
He looked over at the blonde again and she held up her half empty glass and gestured for him to come over. Jeff glanced back down at the phone.

  
“Dammit.”

_  
“joes in twenty?”_

  
He sent an apologetic glance across the bar but the blonde only looked mildly annoyed and began making eyes at the guy three seats down.

  
Jeff got to the café before Annie so he went ahead and ordered two coffees and then settled into a table in the corner. Since leaving the bar he’d been running over reasons she would ask to meet him out so late, the night before she was leaving for school and the possible answers had ranged all the way from “she’d decided not to go” to “she’d decided to make good on the living in the moment thing and start making phone calls of B.C.I. nature.”

  
This last one gave him pause and he wondered what he would do if Annie actually tried to make a move. The last time she had kissed him… well, he hadn’t exactly resisted.

  
The bell above the door chimed and she bounded in all smiles.

  
Jeff held up the coffee. “Decaf?”

  
She laughed, “How did you know?”

  
“I just figured.”

  
She slid down across from him and leaned forward. Sniffed the air. “Jeff, have you been drinking? Did you drive here?”

  
“Relax  _Greendale 911_ , I walked. I was just down the street.”

  
She narrowed her eyes but seemed to accept this and leaned back in her seat.

  
“So?” 

  
“Jeff, I’m leaving tomorrow.”

  
“I’m aware of this. I think Shirley’s somewhere making you enough brownies to last the entire school year.”

  
This was apparently the wrong thing to say because Annie’s eyes filled with sudden tears.

  
Jeff set his coffee back down. 

  
“What’s up? Because, if you called me here to talk you out of leaving then you’re talking to the wrong person. I say run. Run as far and as fast as you possibly can from this place.”

  
“No.” She twisted her hands nervously in front of her. “I was sitting at home, looking at all these boxes and I just didn’t want to be there anymore. So I called you.”

  
She looked up and winced, “It was stupid. I’m sorry. You were probably.” She gestured in the vague direction of the bar. “You can go. It’s okay. I’ll just-”

  
Jeff reached over and rested his hand over hers. Smiled.

  
“It’s okay.” He shook his head. “Anyway, it was a pretty boring night for me too.”

  
“Liar.” 

  
He shrugged and took a sip of his coffee. “You know, you’re going to be okay? Right? And we’re all going to be friends and we’ll still see each other and you’ll make new friends and keep the old and when one door closes another one opens and … do I have to keep going with this?” 

  
Annie laughed and shook her head. “No. I know. Sometimes it’s all just a little overwhelming. But thanks for the pep talk.”

  
“It wasn’t my best.”

  
“Do you want to give it another shot?”

  
“Okay.” He leaned back and cracked his knuckles. “Annie. You’re standing here tonight on the precipice of this new life you’re about to jump into. And the storms you’ve already weathered.”

  
She laughed and threw her stir straw at him. “Boo. Cheesy.”

  
“Okay, okay.”

  
“Any real advice?”

  
He thought about it, “Well… just don’t take it too seriously Annie.” He looked at her pointedly. “Have fun. Although, not  _too_ much fun because otherwise you’ll end up here again. Like me. But you’re  _you_  so I don’t think it will be a problem.” 

  
“Have fun. Got it.” She considered it further, “I’ll try.” 

  
Jeff nodded, imagining Annie going home and making a typed, bullet point list of ways to not take things so seriously. 

  
“Oh and hey, just.” He stared into his coffee. “Stay away from douchebags. You know, cause if something happens we’ll have to send Britta and Shirley up there to kick some ass and they’ll end up throwing someone through a jukebox and then  _I’ll_  have to defend them in court and  _that_  interferes with my plan to do as little as possible for the next two years.”

  
Annie was smiling brightly, “Okay, stay away from… douchebags.” Her voice came out thickly and Jeff looked up to catch her gaze. They watched each other for a moment before Annie looked down, “So, these douchebags, how will I know them when I see them?”

  
“Well, good rule of thumb is to stay away from guys who don’t wear shoes or who shave shapes into their faces.”

  
She snorted “Jeff.”

  
“Oh, and the ones who sit in dark corners twirling their mustaches, they’re probably up to no good either.”

  
“Twirling mustaches? Will they be wearing capes too?”

  
“Most likely.”

  
They ended up staying at the café until it closed and then she drove him back to his car at the bar. Neither of them seemed to be in much of a hurry though and they sat there together in her car, listening to the sounds of Motown straining softly through the speakers.

  
“No Backstreet Boys?”

  
She rolled her eyes, “My parents only let me listen to the oldies station when I was growing up. It was all I knew for awhile. Now it just reminds me of home.”

  
He nodded, leaned his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes.

_  
Sittin' in the mornin' sun  
I'll be sittin' when the evenin' come  
Watching the ships roll in  
And then I watch 'em roll away again, yeah_

  
Before he got out of the car she leaned over and pressed a lingering kiss to his cheek.

  
“Thanks Jeff.”

  
As she started to pull back he turned his head slightly, curled his hand around her neck and brought her closer again, his mouth moving over hers. She inhaled sharply against him, then relaxed and her lips were just starting to part when he pulled away. Her eyes were still closed when she felt his lips again, lightly on her forehead.

  
“I’ll see you tomorrow?” he murmured.

  
“Uh-huh.” Her eyes fluttered open. He was smiling. “Tomorrow.”

  
When she crawled into bed that night she wasn’t thinking about the kiss. Or even the way he looked sprawled back in his chair when she saw him through the window of the café. She was thinking about decaf coffee and Shirley’s brownies and 150 miles of open road of ahead of her.  
  


 

~*~*~*~

 

By the time Jeff checks out and they make it out to the parking lot everyone is standing around the van looking impatient and annoyed.

  
Annie’s hair is damp and hanging loose around her shoulders and she’s wearing the dress she wore to graduation, a point that almost made her try and sneak out the back door of the hotel.

  
“Jeff, if I’m wearing the same thing I wore yesterday then they’ll  _know_.”

  
“Trust me, if Britta knows, then they know. We’re past secret keeping here.”

  
Her face is still flushed scarlet though when they reach their friends. There’s an awkward pause before Abed speaks, “I saw this coming actually. It was one of several possible outcomes."

  
“I think we all saw this coming,” Britta chimes in.

  
“We did?” Troy looks doubtful and she smacks his chest with a laugh.

  
“Pay attention.”

  
“I try to. But usually I just wait for Abed to tell me what’s going on.”

  
Abed nods thoughtfully, “I was afraid I was becoming too much of a spoiler alert. I didn’t want to ruin any possible surprises for anyone.”

  
Shirley looks toward Jeff with a raised eyebrow and a pointed finger, “Jeff, you’re a good man but I swear, if you hurt this girl.”

  
He holds up his hands in surrender, “Okay. Okay.” He looks at them all pointedly before turning his gaze to Annie, “I won’t.”

  
Annie just beams until Pierce taps the hood of the car, “Alright, let’s get this show on the road. 

  
Jeff clears his throat, “I think I’m actually going to stick around here for a couple days. You know, just to avoid another road trip with you people. I didn’t get through four years just to murder one of you  _now_.”

  
Abed holds up a finger, “Ah ha. There it is.” He turns to Troy, “This is Jeff’s way of saying he loves us.”

  
“Aww, man.” Troy looks at the ground bashfully, scuffing his shoe along the asphalt, “We love you too.”

  
Pierce snorts, “Gay.”

  
“Pierce.” Britta says his name slowly and gives him a pointed look, as if she’s reprimanding a small child.

  
“Oh, sorry. Should I have said homo-”

  
“Ughh.” Britta interrupts him and covers her face with her hands, ‘Nevermind.”

  
Pierce looks confused but then shakes it off and yells “Shotgun!” as he races to open the passenger side door.

  
Shirley looks heavenward and sighs, “Fine, but I’m telling you, I won’t think twice about shoving a grown man out the car door while going full speed down the highway. And don’t you even think about touching that radio." 

  
Annie reaches for Britta’s arm before she climbs into the van. “Britta, I just wanted to-” she holds her palms up and shrugs wordlessly.

  
Britta smiles, “Hey, we’re cool. Really. Besides-” She looks between the two, “It kinda makes sense. Just don’t make out in front of me for awhile okay?”

  
Annie nods, “Deal.”

  
The two women hug warmly. When Britta pulls away she reaches into her bag and pulls out a water bottle of clear liquid. “Now, if you excuse me, I have a road trip I need to try and survive.” She winks and hops into the van with the help of Abed’s proffered hand.

  
“Okay, be good you two!” Shirley gives them one last pointed look before starting the engine. 

  
“Drive safe!”

  
“We’ll see you soon!”

  
Annie and Jeff stand and wave as the van pulls from the parking lot and turns down the street into the distance.

  
“Well.”

  
They turn and watch each other until Annie ducks her head. “My car’s over here.”

  
Jeff follows her quietly, squinting into the too bright sunlight.

  
At her car she fumbles with her keys, trying to open the trunk, like she’s nervous, like she hasn’t just spend the entire night talking and laughing and touching this man, her best friend.

  
“Annie.”

  
“Have you ever been to Europe?” she asks suddenly. The trunk pops open.

  
“Uh. No.”

  
“We should go.” She nods decisively as she shoves his bag into the car and slams the trunk closed again.

  
“Okay.” He smiles at her bemusedly. “How about now?" 

  
“What?” She looks up at him sharply, “Jeff, I don’t even have a passport. And where would we stay? And what cities or countries do we even want to see and-”

  
“Hey.” He laughs and steps closer to cup her face in his hands. “I was kidding.”

  
“Oh.” She looks chagrined and Jeff shakes his head at her while bending and kissing her forehead.

  
“Living in the moment, my ass.”

  
“Hey! It’s not that easy. I.” She shrugs, “I’m trying.”

  
He smiles, “Me too.”

  
She sinks into him and nuzzles her nose against his chest, “I’m not sure what’s going to happen now.”

  
“Well.” He presses his lips to the top of her head. “How about we go to breakfast and get some coffee, then go back to your place and stay in bed for three days?”

  
Annie flushes deeply.

  
“And we’ll talk about Europe. Or New York. Or Rancho Cucamonga. Wherever.”

  
She pulls away and laughs, “Rancho Cucamonga?” 

  
“I don’t know. Have you ever been there?”

  
“No. I don’t even know where that is.” They get into the car and Annie starts the engine.

  
“We’ll MapQuest it. It sounds exotic right? Come on Watts, think crazy.”

  
“Um, I’m sorry but you are totally Watts in this situation.”

  
“Uh. No. I am clearly Eric Stoltz.”

  
She rolls her eyes and pulls the car onto the road. “Please.”

  
Jeff smiles and leans back with his arm resting against the open window. “Are you doubting my ability to be as cool as the 80’s Brat Pack?”

  
Annie only laughs, the warm summer breeze rustling the hair around her face and shoulders as she presses down on the gas pedal and accelerates onto the highway.

 

~*~*~*~

 

_May 20, 2010_

Jeff pulled her into his arms and kissed her hard, feeling her quick indrawn breath, the way she was suddenly clutching at him and kissing him back. He cradled her head as her fingertips pressed against his neck, then slid into his hair and he couldn’t help but groan and hold her tighter.

  
She started to pull away but he held her there a moment longer, lips just pressed against hers and she sighed into his mouth, over his tongue. They parted slightly, noses brushing together, breathing against each other until she stepped back and looked at him with a stunned expression.

  
Then she covered her face with her hands and let out a high pitched, “I’m so sorry.”

  
Jeff stared for a moment before huffing out a shaky laugh, “Why are you apologizing?”

  
Annie peered at him between two fingers, “I don’t know. I shouldn’t have done that.”

  
He swallowed, looked up, “Well.” And then he laughed again and scrubbed his hands over his face. “This  _night._ ”

  
There was a bit of incredulity in his voice and Annie finally dropped her hands to look up at him.

  
“There’s an entire gym full of people and men in  _Dalmatian_  costume waiting to see if I’m going to chose Britta or Slater and I come out here and…” he trailed off.

  
Annie bit her lip, “I’m not declaring my love for you.”

  
Jeff raised his eyebrow, “What?”

  
She flushed, “I’m not  _in love_  with you.” Her words were slow and measured but Jeff was smiling.

  
“No. I know.” He waved his hand in the direction of the gym. “Neither are they. But you have to admit, weird night for me, right?" 

  
She nodded, “ _I_ was on my way to  _Delaware_  with my boyfriend and now I’m back here. With  _no_  boyfriend.” 

  
“So pretty much, weird night all around.” 

  
There was an awkward pause and then Annie tilted her head, “Did you say, ‘men in Dalmatian costume’?”

  
Jeff’s eyes widened “Oh.  _Yeah_. Did I not tell you about that? Apparently the Dean swings in  _three_ directions.”

  
Annie looked a little horrified but she laughed and tugged on his hand, “I have to see this.”

  
“Oh, I’m not going back in there.”

  
“Come on Jeff, you have to face this sooner or later.”

  
“I vote later. Much, much later. Maybe in the fall. Maybe never.”

  
She stared him down, tugging again on his hand.

  
He sighed, “Fine. But I hate you.”

  
“I know. I can live with that.” She curled her hand against his arm and together they made their way slowly back to the cafeteria. 

  
~*~*~*~

 

End.


End file.
